LIBRARY 

OF    THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


Class 


edby  the  Internet  Archive 
2007  with  funding  from 
licrosoft  Cornoration 


THE 


EARLY  SCHOOLS 


OF 


METHODISM 


BY 


A.  W.   CUMMINGS,   D.D.,   LL.D., 

WELLSVILLE,  N.  Y. 


NEW  YORK: 
PHILLIPS    &    HUNT. 

CINCINNATI: 
CHANS  TO  N   <&    ST  OWE. 

18S6. 


GENEBAL 


Copyright,  1886,  by 

PHILLIPS    &    HUNT, 

New  York. 


PREFACE 


Many  years  ago  the  undersigned  became  interested  in  the 
schools  opened  principally  through  the  exertions  of  Bishop 
Asbury.  From  the  Bishop's  "  Journal,"  their  names,  and  but 
little  more,  were  learned.  Methodist  historians  said  but  little 
of  any  of  them,  and  nothing  of  most.  In  response  to  hun- 
dreds of  letters,  and  from  certain  local  histories  of  States  and 
counties,  such  facts  were  gathered  as  enabled  the  writer  to 
prepare  brief  historical  sketches  of  all  the  Methodist  schools 
belonging  to  the  Asburyan  period.  In  October,  1884,  he 
submitted  to  our  veteran  editor  of  the  "  Methodist  Review  " 
the  question,  "  What  shall  be  done  with  these  sketches,  so  as 
most  to  benefit  the  Church  ? "  The  response  was,  "  I  am 
glad  you  have  done  the  work  indicated.  The  only  right 
thing  to  do  with  your  MSS.  is  to  publish  them  in  permanent 
form.  What  you  have  collected  respecting  the  schools  of 
Bishop  Asbury  is  of  very  great  value.  It  will  stand  alone ; 
and  also  correct  some  wide -spread  misapprehensions;  a 
book  made  up  of  these  accounts,  and  then  of  the  renewed 
movements,  coming  down  to  about  1840.  I  hope  you  will 
prepare  such  a  book." 

To  succeed  in  the  work  recommended  by  Dr.  Curry,  the  aid 
of  the  schools  to  be  named  in  the  volume  was  indispensable. 

Letters  were  addressed  to  many  of  the  leading  educators  in 
the  Church,  and  to  some  other  ofiicials.  Without  exception 
the  plan  proposed  by  Dr.  Curry  was  approved.  President 
Beach,  of  Wesleyan  University,  wrote  :  "  I  am  glad  you  have 
taken   this   work    in   hand.      I   will   aid    you."      President 

1 1 49;^fi 


4  Pkeface. 

McCauley,  of  Dickinson  College :  "  I  tliink  most  favorably 
of  your  enterprise."  President  Warren,  of  Boston  Univer- 
sity :  "  I  am  very  glad  that  some  one  has  taken  in  hand  the 
too -long -neglected  task  of  investigating  and  recording  the 
history  of  the  lost  schools  of  Bishop  Asbury."  Dr.  Steele, 
of  Wesleyan  Academy  :  "  I  heartily  approve  your  under- 
taking." Principal  Smith,  of  Maine  Wesleyan  Seminary : 
"The  puhlication  which  you  propose  seems  to  me  exceed- 
ingly desirable."  Dr.  Edward  Cook,  late  president  of  Claf- 
lin  University :  "  I  am  very  glad  you  have  undertaken  the 
important  work  you  have  in  hand."  Bishop  Harris  wrote : 
"  I  am  well  pleased  with  your  purpose  to  prepare  a  history 
of  the  early  Methodist  Schools." 

A  few  of  the  schools  invited  to  appear  in  this  volume 
failed  to  furnish  their  sketches.  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute 
did  not  belong  to  the  period,  but  I  gladly  accepted  the  arti- 
cle while  it  was  within  reach. 

To  give  the  general  public  a  more  complete  view  of  oar 
educational  work,  to  the  original  plan  has  been  added 
sketches  of  three  of  our  best-equipped  biblical  schools,  and 
also  of  three  of  the  schools  for  Freedmen.  To  cover  the 
field  the  greatest  brevity  possible  has  been  employed,  and 
much  has  been  omitted  in  regard  to  persons  and  facts. 
Many  of  the  sketches  record  heroic  achievements.  We  enter 
the  second  century  of  our  Church  history  with  more  than 
two  hundred  Methodist  seminaries,  colleges,  and  universi- 
ties, and  our  general  educational  work,  like  our  mission  and 
Church  extension  work,  in  the  hands  of  an  efficient  General 
Conference  Board. 

The  writer's  thanks  are  hereby  tendered  to  all  who  have 
aided  him  in  this  work.  A.  W.  Cummings. 

Wellsville,  N.  Y. 


CONTENTS 


PART  I. 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  KiNGSwooD  School,  Bristol,  England 9 

II.  CoKESBURY  College,  Abingdon,  Maryland 20 

III.  Ebenezer  Academy,  Virginia 35 

IV.  Bethel  Acad»my,  Kentucky 44 

V.  Union  School  and  Madison  College,  Uniontown,  Pa 59 

VI.  Wesley  and  Whitefield  School,  Georgia 65 

VII.  CoKESBCRY  School,  North  Carolina 70 

VIII.  Bethel  Academy,  Mount  Bethel,  Newberry  County,  S.  C 75 

IX.  AsBURY  College,  Baltimore,  Md 89 


TAET   II. 

I.  The  Wesleyan  Academy,  Newmarket  and  Wilbrahah 94 

BY   DAVID  SHERMAN,  D.D. 

II.  Augusta  College,  Kentucky 114 

BY    DANIEL   STEVEN.S0N,  D.D. 

III.  Cazenovia  Seminary ,, 129 

BY    BOSTWICK    HAWLEY,   D.D. 


6  Coin'ENTS. 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

IV.  Maine  Wesley  an  Seminary  and  Female  College 143 

BY   GENERAL  JOHN   J,    PERRY. 

Y.  The  Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary 156 

BY  J.  E.  bills,  d.d.  • 

VI.  The  Wesleyan  University 109 

BY   EDWARD    COOKE,    D.D. 

VII.  Dickinson  College , 18Y 

BY   professor  J.  H.  MORGAN,  A.M. 

VIII.  Allegheny  College 202 

FROM  WARNERS,  BEARS,  &  CO.'S  "  HISTORY  OP  CRAWFORD  CO.,  PA.'» 
BY  A.  W.  CUMMINGS,  D.D.,  LL.D. 

IX.  Western  Reserve  Seminary 214 

BY   REV.    E.  A.  WHITWAM,  A.M. 

X.  NoRWALK  Seminary 217 

BY  EDWARD   THOMSON,  A.M.,  PH.D. 

XI.  McKendree  College 226 

BY  A.  W.  CUMMINGS,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  AND  PROF.  S.  H,  DENEEN,  A.M.,  PH.D. 

XII.  Amenia   Seminary 239 

BY   ALBERT   S.  HUNT,  D.D. 

XIII.  AsBURY  College  of  De  Pauw  University 253 

BY  MISS   IRENE   MARTIN. 

XIV.  Victoria  University,  Canada 203 

BY  professor   NATHANIEL    BURWASH,  S.T.D, 

XV.  GouvERNEUR  Wesleyan  Seminary 2S0 

BY  A.  W.  CUMMINGS,  D.D.,   LL.D. 

XVI.  Ives  Seminary 294 

from  the  "northern  christian  advocate." 

XVII.  Pennington  Seminary 298 

BY   THOMAS   HANLON,  D.D, 

XVIII.  The  Schools  in  Berea,  Ohio 310 

BY   REV.  A.  SCHUYLER,  LL.D. 


Contents.  7 

CHAPTER  TAQK 

XIX.  The  East  Greenwich  Academy 325 

BY  PROFESSOR   O.  W.  SCOTT. 

XX.  Ohio  Wesleyan  University 336 

BY    REV.  PROFESSOR   W.  G.   WILLIAMS,  LL.D. 

XXI.  Cincinnati  Wesleyan  College  for  Young  Women 34S 

BY    MRS.    McCLELLAN   BROWN,  VICE-PRESIDENT. 

XXII.  The  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute 355 

BY  DANIEL  P.  KIDDER,  D.D. 


PAET   III. 

I.  Founding  and  Earliest  History  op  the  School  of  Theology  of 
Boston  University 369 

by  president  william  f.  warren,  s.t.d.,  ll.d. 

II.  Garrett  Biblical  Institute 380 

BY    HON.    judge   GRANT   GOODRICH. 

III.  Drew  Theological  Seminary 388 

BY   HENRY   A.    BUTTZ,  D.D. 


PART  IV. 

I.  Central  Tennessee  College 39G 

BY    Pr.K„SII)KNT  J.    BUADEN,   D.D. 

II.  Clark  University 4CS 

BY    PRESIDENT    REV.   E.  O.    THAYER,   A.M. 

III.  Baker  In.stitutk  and  Claflin  University 419 

BY    PRE.SIDKNT  LEWIS  M.   DUNTON,  D.D. 


Contents. 


APPENDIX. 

♦ 

PAGE 

A.  Literary  Institutions  Owned  or  Controlled  by  the  Methodist  Epis- 

copal Church  prior  to  1884,  Chronologically  arranged 426 

B.  Schools  Conducted  in   the    Interest  op  the  Methodist  Episcopal 

Church  under  Private  Ownership  prior  to  1884,  Chronologic- 
ally arranged 428 

C.  Classified  List  op  Educational  Institutions  op  the  Methodist  Epis- 

copal Church  Existing  in  1886 429 


THE 

EARLY  SCHOOLS  OE  METHODISM. 


PART    I. 
CHAPTER    I. 

KINGSWOOD   SCHOOL,    BRISTOL,   ENGLAND. 

Methodism  was  born  in  one  of  the  most  celebrated  univer- 
sities in  the  world,  and  its  great  founder  was  one  of  the  most 
complete  scholars  upon  whom  Oxford  ever  conferred  a  lit- 
erary title.  It  is  not  surprising,  therefore,  that  educational 
enterprises  early  engaged  the  attention  of  the  followers  of 
John  Wesley  in  both  the  Old  and  the  New  World,  nor  that 
the  zeal  of  Methodists  in  the  cause  of  education  has  been  both 
active  and  highly  honorable  to  them  as  a  body. 

Raised  up  by  God,  at  a  time  of  great  declension  in  piety, 
to  stand  at  the  head  of  a  vast  moral  movement  for  the  re- 
vival of  tme  religion  and  for  the  spreading  of  holiness  over 
the  earth,  Methodism  did  not  fail  to  fully  comprehend  the 
value  of  sound  literature,  and  of  classical  and  scientific 
knowledge  being  placed  within  the  reach  of  those  brought 
to  (yhrist  through  its  instrumentality,  in  so  far  as  they  had 
time,  taste,  and  opportunity  for  such  pursuits. 

Through  many  years  of  his  earlier  ministry  Wesley  em- 
ployed his  intervals  between  frequent  journeys  and  exces- 
sive pulpit  labors  in  writing  and  publishing  tracts  and  siniill 
books  for  general  reading.    In  these  all  the  essential  di)Ctrines 


10  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

of  religion  were  examined  and  elucidated.  As  fast  as  tliey 
were  printed,  liis  assistant  ministers  and  lay  helpers  bore 
them  off  to  every  part  of  Great  Britain,  and  scattered  them, 
like  autumn  leaves,  among  the  people. 

These  publications  contributed,  perhaps  not  less  than  his 
fresh,  vigorous  pulpit  ministrations,  in  pushing  forward  the 
great  religious  revival  and  reform  in  which  he  was  engaged, 
and  for  which  Heaven  seems  especially  to  have  commissioned 
him.  He  who  exclaimed  "  The  world  is  my  parish ! "  saw, 
that  to  arouse  a  slumbering  world  and  conquer  it  for  Christ, 
to  the  power  of  the  pulpit  and  the  press  must  be  joined 
that  of  the  school ;  that  these  were  Heaven's  artillery  for 
arousing  the  nations,  and  compelling  the  world  to  surrender 
to  the  great  Captain  of  man's  salvation. 

At  one  of  the  earlier  Methodist  Conferences  held  by  Mr. 
Wesley,  consisting  of  less  than  a  dozen  members  (and  that 
included  the  entire  ministry  in  union  with  the  Wesleys),  the 
expediency  of  founding  an  institution  of  learning  was  gravely 
discussed.  Soon  afterward,  in  1748,  Kingswood  School  was 
opened  with  twenty-eight  pupils. 

At  the  request  of  John  Wesley  the  corner-stone  of  Kings- 
wood  School  was  laid  by  that  prince  of  orators  and  great 
evangelist,  Rev.  George  Whitelield.  The  occasion  was 
momentous — a  great  enterprise  was  to  be  inaugurated;  its 
success  depended  upon  God's  blessing.  After  placing  the 
corner-stone  in  position,  Whitefield — surrounded  by  hundreds 
of  the  colliers,  reformed  through  the  agenc}^  of  the  Methodist 
itinerants — kneeling  upon  the  earth,  prayed  that  "  the  gates 
of  hell "  might  not  prevail  against  the  school  to  be  estab- 
lished within  the  walls  then  being  raised.  The  prostrate 
multitude  of  devout  converts,  now  awakened  to  a  new  intel- 
lectual  as  well  as  a  moral  life,  responded   most    heartily, 


KiNGSwooD  ScnooL.  11 

"  Amen."  The  prayer  of  consecration  was  answered ;  enemies 
opposed,  the  undertaking  received  ridicule,  contempt,  and 
nearly  every  other  form  of  opposition  ;  yet  it  went  steadily 
on,  and  still  it  goes  on,  though  both  its  early  friends  and  ene- 
mies have  long  since  gone  to  their  respective  rewards.  This 
institution,  without  the  name,  was,  in  fact,  a  college  of  high 
grade.  The  curriculum — embracing  history,  chronology, 
geography,  rhetoric,  logic,  ethics,  metaphysics,  the  pure  and 
the  mixed  mathematics,  the  English,  French,  Latin,  Greek, 
and  Hebrew  languages — was  as  extensive  as  at  Oxford  or 
Cambridge,  and  quite  as  thoroughly  taught.  No  man  more 
thoroughly  despised  mere  pretense  or  show  than  John 
Wesley.  To  erect  the  building  for  the  school  he  expended 
all  that,  by  the  most  rigid  economy  and  greatest  self-denial, 
he  could  save  from  his  University  Fellowship. 

All  that  he  received  from  sale  of  his  numerous  publica- 
tions, and  could  collect  from  his  friends,  he  expended  in 
meeting  its  current  expenses.  This  school  was  the  greatest 
of  Mr.  Wesley's  financial  undertakings,  and  it  became  the 
burden  of  his  life. 

That  the  reader  may  judge  of  its  merits,  the  rules  for  its 
government  and  his  general  aims  are,  in  condensed  form, 
copied  from  the  seventh  volume  of  his  published  works : 

Our  design  is,  with  God's  assistance,  to  train  up  children  in  every 
branch  of  useful  learning.  We  teach  none  but  boarders.  These  are 
taken  in,  being  between  the  ages  of  six  and  twelve  years,  in  order  to 
be  taught  reading,  writing,  aritlimetic,  English,  French,  Latin,  Greek, 
Hebrew,  history,  geography,  chronology,  rhetoric,  logic,  ethics,  geom- 
etry, algebra,  physics,  and  music. 

The  school  contains  eight  classes.  In  the  first  class  the  scholars  read 
"Instructions  for  Children  "  and  "Lessons  for  Children,"  and  begin 
learning  to  write. 

In  the  second  class  they  road  "The  Manners  of  the  Ancient  Chris- 


12  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

tians,"  go  on  in  writing,  learn  the  ''Short  English  Grammar,"  the 
"  Short  Latin  Grammar,"  read  "  Prielectiones  Pueriles,"  translate  them 
into  English,  and  "  Instructions  for  Children  "  into  Latin,  part  of  which 
they  transcribe  and  repeat. 

In  the  third  class  they  read  Dr.  Cave's  "Primitive  Christianity,"  go 
on  in  writing,  perfect  themselves  in  the  English  and  Latin  Grammar, 
read  "  Corderii  Colloquia  Selecta"  and  "Historia3  Selecta?,"  translate 
^'Historiae  Select 03 "  into  English,  and  "Lessons  for  Children"  into 
Latin,  part  of  which  they  transcribe  and  repeat. 

In  the  fourth  class  they  read  "Pilgrim's  Progress,"  perfect  them- 
selves in  writing,  learn  Dilworth's  "Arithmetic,"  read  Castellio's 
"Kempis"  and  Cornelius  Nepos,  translate  Castellio  into  English,  and 
"  Manners  of  the  Ancient  Christians"  into  Latin;  transcribe  and  repeat 
select  portions  of  "  Moral  and  Sacred  Poems." 

In  the  fifth  class  they  read  "The  Life  of  Mr.  Haliburton,"  perfect 
themselves  in  arithmetic,  read  Select  Dialogues  of  Erasmus,  Phsedrus, 
and  Sallust;  translate  Erasmus  into  English  and  "  Primitive  Christian- 
ity "  into  Latin ;  transcribe  and  repeat  select  portions  of  * '  Moral  and 
Sacred  Poems." 

In  the  sixth  class  they  read  "  The  Life  of  Mr.  De  Renty  "  and  Ken- 
net's  "Roman  Antiquities;"  they  learn  Randal's  Geography,  read  Caj- 
sar,  select  portions  of  Terence  and  Valleius  Paterculus,  translate  Eras- 
mus into  English,  and  "The  Life  of  Mr.  Haliburton"  into  Latin;  tran- 
scribe and  repeat  select  portions  of  "  Sacred  Hj'mns  and  Poems." 

In  the  seventh  class  they  read  Mr.  Law's  "  Christian  Perfection"  and 
Archbishop  Potter's  "Greek  Antiquities;"  they  learn  "Bengelii  Intro- 
ductio ad  Chronologiam,"  with  Mart-hall's  "Chronological  Tables ; "  read 
TuUy's  ' '  Offices  "  and  Virgil's  ^neid ;  translate  Bengelius  into  English, 
and  Mr.  Law  into  Latin ;  learn  (those  who  have  a  turn  for  it)  to  make 
verses  and  the  "  Short  Greek  Grammar;"  read  the  epistles  of  St.  John; 
transcribe  and  repeat  select  portions  of  Milton. 

In  the  eighth  class  they  read  Mr.  Law's  *'  Serious  Call  "  and  Lewis's 
"Hebrew  Antiquities;"  they  learn  to  make  themes  and  to  declaim; 
learn  Vossius's  Rhetoric;  read  Tully's  Tusculan  Questions  and  "  Selecta 
ex  Ovidio,  Virgilio,  Horatio,  Juvenale,  Persio,  Martiale ;"  perfect  them- 
selves in  the  Greek  Grammar;  read  the  Gospels  and  six  books  of 
Homer's  Iliad ;  translate  Tully  into  English,  and  Mr.  Law  into  Latin ; 


KiNGSwooD  School.  13 

learn  the  "  Short  Hebrew  Grammar"  and  read  Genesis;  transcribe  and 
repeat  "  Selecta  ex  Virgilio,  Horatio,  Juvenale." 

Besides  this  prescribed  course,  which  all  must  pursue,  there 
was  an  optional  course  for  those  "who  intended  to  go  through 
a  course  of  academical  learning."  This  was  a  very  heavy 
course,  covering  four  years,  but  which,  with  modern  habits 
of  study,  very  few  would  master  in  that  time.  Mr.  Wesley's 
students  never  played.  At  the  end  of  this  last  course  Mr. 
Wesley  says,  "  Whoever  carefully  goes  through  this  course 
will  be  a  better  scholar  than  nine  in  ten  of  the  graduates  of 
Oxford  or  Cambridge." 

Great  care  was  exercised  in  the  admission  of  pupils.  !N"one 
but  boarding  pupils  were  admitted,  and  of  these  all  were 
refused  entrance  unless  their  parents  or  guardians  agreed 
that  they  should  observe  all  the  regulations  of  the  school,  one 
of  which  was,  that  the  child  should  not  be  absent  from  school 
even  for  a  day  until  they  were  finally  removed. 

The  students  were  under  the  surveillance  of  a  tutor  day 
and  night.  To  secure  healthy  recreation  at  regular  hours,  on 
fair  days  all  worked  in  the  garden,  and  on  rainy  days  in  the 
house ;  they  slept  in  a  common  hall,  each  in  a  separate  bed  ; 
one  or  more  of  the  teachers  slept  in  the  same  room,  in  which, 
during  the  night,  a  light  was  kept  burning. 

They  retired  early  and  rose  at  four  o'clock  in  the  morning, 
winter  and  summer,  and  spent  one  hour  in  private  in  reading, 
singing,  meditation,  and  prayer.  At  six  they  breakfasted, 
and  were  ready  to  begin  the  studies  of  the  day  at  seven. 
They  never  worked  alone,  but  always  in  the  presence  of  a 
"  master."     Each  hour  had  its  regular  duties. 

Mr.  Wesley  said :  "It  is  our  particular  desire  that  all  edu- 
cated here  may  be  brought  up  in  the  fear  of  God,  and  at 
the  utmost  distance,  as  from  vice  in  general,  so  in  particular 


14  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

from  idleness  and  effeminacy.  The  cliildren,  therefore,  of 
tender  parents,  so  called  (who  are,  indeed,  offering  up  their 
sons  and  tlieir  daughters  unto  devils),  have  no  business  here." 

Experience  demonstrated  that  the  discipline  was  needlessly 
rigid,  and,  after  some  years,  was  modified,  yet  its  principal 
features  were  preserved. 

For  many  years  before  the  opening  of  Kingswood,  the  at- 
tention of  Mr.  Wesley  had  been  directed  to  the  defects  of  the 
schools,  even  the  best  schools,  in  England  and  Germany. 

To  the  location  of  schools  in  towns,  and  still  more  in  cities, 
he  urged  the  objection  that  there  were  too  many  things  to 
divert  attention,  and  too  much  exposure  to  the  influence  of 
vicious  examples.  He  strongly  objected  to  the  j)romiscuous 
admission  of  all  applicants,  bad  as  well  as  good.  Irreligious 
teachers  was  another  objection — those  who  cared  nothing 
whetlier  their  pupils  were  "  Papists  or  Protestants,  Turks  or 
Christians."  He  urged  that  most  of  the  schools  of  his  day — 
and,  to  some  extent,  we  may  add  of  ours — were  defective  in 
tlje  subjects  and  methods  of  instruction. 

"  In  some  the  children  are  taught  little  or  no  arithmetic ; 
in  others  little  care  is  taken  of  tlieir  writing.  In  many  they 
leara  scarce  the  elements  of  geography,  and  as  little  of  chro- 
nology. There  are  exceeding  few  wherein  the  scholars  are 
thoroughly  taught  even  the  Latin  and  Greek  tongues.  Tlie 
books  which  they  read  are  not  well  chosen.  The  language  is 
not  standard,  not  even  in  the  Latin." 

To  remedy  these  and  other  defects  he  determined  to  estab- 
lish a  school. 

"  The  first  point  was  to  find  a  proper  location,  not  too  far 
from  a  great  town,  which  I  saw  would  be  liighly  inconven- 
ient for  a  large  family  ;  nor  yet  too  near,  and  much  less  in  it. 
After  mature  consideration,  I  chose  a  spot  in  the  middle  of 


KiNGSwooD  School.  16 

Kingsvv'ood,  three  miles  from  Bristol.  It  was  quite  private, 
remote  from  all  public  roads,  on  the  side  of  a  small  hill, 
affording  room  for  large  gardens." 

His  next  care  was  to  procure  suitable  teachers.  He  said : 
"  None  would  answer  my  purpose  but  men  who  were  truly 
devoted  to  God ;  who  sought  nothing  on  earth,  neither  pleas- 
ure nor  ease  nor  profit  nor  the  praise  of  men,  but  simply  to 
glorify  God  with  their  bodies  and  spirits." 

The  better  class  of  Methodists,  Arminian  and  Calvinistic, 
favored  his  designs  and  gave  earnest  co-operation.  That 
saintly  woman,  Lady  Maxwell — early  bereft  of  husband  and 
her  only  child,  and  who  lived  only  for  others  and  to  glorify 
God — gave  at  first  twenty-five  hundred  dollars ;  and  after- 
ward, learning  that  fifteen  hundred  dollars  more  was  required 
to  free  Mr.  Wesley  from  all  pecuniary  responsibility  for  the 
building,  also  gladly  gave  him  that  sum.  The  edifice,  when 
completed,  was  large  enough  for  fifty  pupils,  and  all  the 
teachers  and  servants. 

George  Whitetield  and  others  gave  all  they  could.  Mr. 
Wesley,  to  remedy  the  defects  of  other  schools,  wrote  and  pub- 
lished grammars  of  the  English,  Latin,  Greek,  and  Hebrew 
languages;  also  compendiumsof  rhetoric,  logic,  natural,  men- 
tal, and  moral  philosophy,  and  several  books  of  history ;  and 
issued  revised  and  expurgated  editions  of  the  classics  used  in 
the  school,  carefully  excluding  every  thing  that  was  immod- 
est or  profane.  That  the  institution  might  be  under  his  con- 
stant inspection,  Mr.  Wesley  had,  within  the  edifice,  a  private 
room  and  a  study  for  his  own  use.  He  devoted  much  of  his 
time,  and  for  years  nearly  all  his  income,  to  the  school. 
Twenty-five  years  after  it  went  into  operation,  on  one  of  his 
visits,  deprecating  some  things  in  the  management,  he  added, 
"  Still,  this  comes  nearer  a  Christian  school  than  any  I  know 


16  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

in  the  kingdom."  But  it  did  not  for  years  reach  the  stand- 
ard of  discipline  that  he  desired. 

September  8, 1781,  he  wrote  :  "  I  went  over  to  Kingswood 
and  made  particular  inquiry  into  the  management  of  the 
school.  I  found  some  of  tlie  rules  had  not  been  observed, 
particularly  that  of  rising  in  the  morning.  Surely  Satan  has 
a  peculiar  spite  at  this  school !  What  trouble  has  it  cost  me 
for  above  thirty  years !  I  can  plan,  but  who  will  execute  ? 
I  know  not ;  God  help  me  !  " 

March  5, 1784,  he  made  this  entry  in  his  Journal :  "  I  talked 
at  large  with  the  masters  in  Kingswood  School,  who  are  now 
just  such  as  I  wished  for.  At  length  the  rules  of  the  house 
are  punctually  observed ;  the  children  are  in  good  order." 

March  7,  1788,  he  wrote:  "I  went  to  Kingswood  School 
and  found  every  thing  in  excellent  order." 

September  11,  1789,  he  wrote :  "  I  went  over  to  Kings- 
wood  ;  sweet  recess !  where  every  thing  is  now  just  as  I 
wish." 

What  a  labor  and  what  a  triumph  !  At  his  death,  as,  in- 
deed, for  some  time  before,  the  school  was  managed  by  a 
board  of  stewards  of  his  own  appointment,  of  whom  he  gave 
this  testimony  :  "  I  have  delivered  the  management  of  Kings- 
wood  School  to  stewards  on  whom  I  could  depend.  So  I 
have  cast  a  heavy  load  off  my  shoulders.  Blessed  be  God, 
for  able  and  faithful  men  who  will  do  this  work  without  any 
temporal  reward  !  " 

A  few  years  after  Mr.  Wesley  died,  so  urgent  was  the 
want,  and  so  just  the  claim,  tliat  the  stewards  or  trustees 
appropriated  this  school  exclusively  to  the  education  of  the 
sons  of  the  Wesleyan  itinerant  ministers  laboring  in  the 
home  or  foreign  missionary  fields ;  and  more  room  being 
required  for  this  class  of  pupils,  another  school  was  opened 


Kings  WOOD  School.  17 

at  Woodhouse  Grove,  near  the  city  of  Leeds,  for  the  sons  of 
Methodist  ministers.  From  two  hundred  to  three  hundred 
sons  of  itinerants  are  here  gratuitously  provided  with  board, 
lodging,  and  the  best  of  instructors,  all  at  the  expense  of 
the  generous  Methodists  of  Great  Britain. 

As  the  denomination  increased  other  schools  became 
necessary,  and,  with  a  generosity  unsurpassed,  the  Wesley- 
ans  provided  them  in  all  the  British  realm.  The  theological 
schools  at  Richmond  and  Didsbury ;  New  Kingswood  School ; 
the  "Wesley an  Colleges  at  Taunton,  Sheffield,  Birmingham, 
Leeds,  and  others,  in  England,  the  Wesleyan  Methodist  Col- 
lege, Belfast,  and  the  Wesleyan  Gonnectional  School,  Dublin, 
and  their  noble  institutions  in  Australia — are  justly  the  pride 
of  the  British  Methodists.  To  their  management  they  con- 
secrate the  best  talent  of  their  ministry  and  laity,  and  many 
thousands  of  dollars  annually. 

Kingswood  School,  as  organized  by  the  Rev.  John  Wesley, 
is  still  a  living  fact,  and  is  doing  most  excellent  work.  Owing 
to  the  deterioration  of  the  site,  and  especially  in  consequence 
of  the  failure  of  the  water  supply  through  the  great  increase 
of  the  coal  mines  in  the  vicinity,  in  the  year  1852  the 
school  was  removed  from  Kingswood  to  what  is  called  New 
Kingswood,  a  most  picturesque  and  beautiful  site  on  Lans- 
downe  Hill,  in  the  neighborhood  of  Bath,  England,  seven 
miles  from  its  former  location.  A  noble  edifice,  of  the 
Elizabethan  order  of  architecture,  was  erected  at  an  expense 
of  $90,000.  Additional  land  has  since  been  purchased,  and 
in  the  year  1883  additions  were  made  to  the  building,  which, 
with  the  increase  of  furniture,  cost  $75,000.  The  entire  outlay 
for  land,  building,  and  furniture  has  been  but  little  less  than 
$200,000.  There  are  now  accommodations  for  three  hun- 
dred sons  of  Wesleyan  ministers ;  none  other  are  eligible  to 


18  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

admission.  The  number  now,  February,  1885,  in  actual 
attendance,  is  two  hundred  and  ninety.  The  Rev.  John  H. 
Lord  is  the  moral  governor  and  chaplain.  The  head  master, 
T.  G.  Osborn,  M.A.,  a  graduate  of  Cambridge  University, 
occupies  a  separate  residence,  built  on  the  estate  at  an 
expense  of  $10,000.  The  chaplain  and  professors  reside  in 
the  school  edifice.  There  are  several  non-resident  profess- 
ors. Most  of  the  teachers  are  graduates  of  distinguished 
universities. 

The  endowments  of  Kingswood  School  consist  exclusively 
of  scholarships  and  prizes  provided  by  the  munificence  of 
friends,  the  scholarships  being  extra  years  at  the  school,  free 
of  charge  to  the  winners,  or  their  parents  or  guardians. 

The  two  Morley  scholarships  were  secured  by  the  gift  of 
$5,000  by  the  late  George  Morley,  son  of  the  Rev.  George 
Morley,  one  of  the  founders  of  the  Wesleyan  Methodist 
Missionary  Society,  himself  once  a  governor  of  the  school. 
Old  pupils  secured  a  scholarship  by  the  gift  of  $2,500.  The 
Lightfoot  scholarships  were  secured  by  the  gift  of  $3,750, 
presented  by  the  grandfather  of  two  pupils  of  former  years. 

There  is  another  scholarship  founded  on  a  gift  of  land  not 
yet  fully  available.  Thomas  Fernley  founded  a  prize  of 
$200  per  annum  to  the  best  scholar,  or  scholars,  should  there 
be  two  of  equal  merit.  There  are  also  endowed  a  gold 
medal  and  several  *silver  medals  awarded  for  merit  in  speci- 
fied departments. 

For  some  years  past  the  students  of  Kingswood  School 
have  outstripped  those  of  all  other  schools  in  the  kingdom  at 
the  junior  and  senior  examinations  of  Oxford  University. 
The  elder  pupils  have  often  taken  scholarships  at  Oxford  and 
at  Cambridge,  and  some,  immediately  on  leaving  the  school, 
took,  on  examination,  the  Baccalaureate  degree  at  the  Lon- 


KiNGSwooD  School.  19 

don  Univei-sity.  Mr.  W.  P.  Wortliinan,  who  was  honored  by 
being  appointed,  for  the  class  of  18Si,  the  second  wrangler 
at  Cambridge,  was  a  Kingswood  boy. 

Mr.  Wesley's  rigid  rules,  more  or  less  still  in  force,  have 
told  well  upon  the  scholarship  of  the  many  thousands  who 
have  been  trained  at  the  old  and  at  Now  Kingswood  School. 
This  iirst  school  of  Methodism  has  furnished  the  Wcsleyan 
Conference  in  England  many  of  its  distinguished  presidents. 
It  has  given  to  the  Church  many  of  its  most  eminent  minis- 
ters, teachers,  and  missionaries  in  its  foreign  fields.  Its  dis- 
tiuiruished  alumni  are  now  found  in  the  most  honorable 
and  responsible  positions  of  business,  and  in  the  learned  pro- 
fessions. 

Many  of  its  students  are  now  supporting  and  adorning  the 
Church  of  their  fathers,  while  many  others  are  doing  good 
work  as  professors  and  clergymen  in  the  old  Church  of 
England,  which  gave  the  Wesleys  and  others  of  the  first 
Methodist  ministers  to  the  world.  My  thanks  are  due  to 
the  Ilev.  John  II.  Lord,  who  has  just  retired  from  the  gov- 
ernorship of  this  celebrated  school  of  three  hundred  sons  of 
Methodist  ministers,  for  the  facts  given  above.  Mr.  Lord's 
successor  is  the  Rev.  George  Bowden. 


20  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTER  II. 

COKESBURY  COLLEGE,   ABINGDON,  MARYLAND. 

During  the  first  twenty  years  of  its  existence  in  America, 
Methodism  had  no  legal  or  independent  ecclesiastical  organ- 
ization. Starting  at  nearly  the  same  time  in  New  York  and 
in  the  State  of  Maryland,  it  had  rapidly  spread  from  Canada 
to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  from  the  Atlantic  sea  board  to  the 
western  boundary  of  civilized  communities,  with  its  ecclesi- 
astical head  three  thousand  miles  distant  on  the  eastern  side 
of  the  Atlantic  Ocean. 

As  the  recognized  founder,  the  societies  in  America  ear- 
nestly appealed  to  Mr.  John  "Wesley  to  exercise  his  rightful 
authority  to  ordain  and  commission  pastors  with  full  minis- 
terial authority,  and  to  organize  the  Societies  here  as  an  inde- 
pendent Church.  After  due  consideration,  he  resolved  to 
comply  with  their  wishes,  and  in  September,  1784,  with  the 
sanction  of  that  saintlv  man  the  Rev.  John  Fletcher,  of 
Madeley,  and  witli  other  presbyters  of  the  Church  of  En- 
gland assisting,  he  did  formally  consecrate,  ordain,  and  set 
apart  the  Rev.  Thomas  Cuke,  Doctor  of  Civil  Law,  as  a 
Superintendent  for  the  United  States  of  America,  with  full 
authority  to  ordain  others  to  this  and  to  the  lower  offices 
of  the  Christian  ministry. 

Dr.  Coke  arrived  in  ISTew  York  in  November  of  the  same 
year.  On  tlie  25tli  day  of  the  ensuing  month  the  American 
Methodist  ministers,  in  General  Conference  assembled,  pro- 
ceeded to  organize  themselves  and  successors  as  the  Method- 
ist Episcopal  Church,  and  to  make  all  needful  provisions  for 


CoKESBUKY  College.  21 

tlic  wants  of  the  people  who  looked  to  them  for  pastoral 
oversight  and  religious  instruction. 

The  Church,  now  organized,  proceeded  at  once  to  provide 
schools  for  the  education  of  its  youth  and  the  youth  of  the 
country  generally  who  chose  to  avail  themselves  of  these 
provisions.  Bishop  Asbury  preferred  a  school  after  the  plan 
of  Kingswood,  in  England,  and  had  drawn  up  a  subscription 
for  such  a  school  before  Bishop  Coke  arrived  in  America, 
but  Dr.  Coke  preferred  a  college. 

The  General  Conference  was  made  the  umpire.  The  ven- 
erable men  composing  that  grave  congress  of  the  Church 
favored  Bishop  Coke's  preferences.  The  college,  in  honor  of 
the  two  Bishops,  received  both  their  names.  From  that 
hour  Cokesbury  College  became  an  important  interest  with 
all  Methodists. 

Abingdon,  on  the  Chesapeake,  twenty-five  miles  from 
Baltimore,  was  selected  as  its  seat.  The  Bishops  undertook 
to  raise  the  funds  for  its  establishment.  When  they  had 
secured  five  thousand  dollars  the  edifice  was  commenced. 

In  1785  the  Bishops  issued  a  circular  to  the  Church, 
detailing  the  objects  and  plan  of  the  college.  Though  some- 
what lengthy,  this  plan  is  so  important  that  it  is  transcribed.* 
Before  giving  this,  Dr.  Coke's  description  of  the  location  is 
presented  as  follows : 

The  situation  delights  mc  more  than  ever.  There  is  not,  I  believe,  a 
point  of  it  from  whence  the  eye  has  not  a  view  of  at  least  twenty 
miles,  and  in  some  parts  the  prospect  extends  to  fifty  miles  in  length. 
The  water  front  forms  one  of  the  most  beautiful  views  in  the  United 
States  ;  the  Chesapeake  Bay,  in  all  its  grandeur,  with  a  fine  navigable 
river— the  Susquehanna — which  empties  into  it,  lying  exposed  to  view 
through  a  great  extent  of  country. 

*  From  Bangs's  "  History  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church." 


22  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Plan  for  Erecting  a  College,  intended  to  advance  Eeligion  in  America,  to  he 
presented  to  the  principal  Members  and  Friends  of  the  Methodist  Episcojxil 

Church. 

The  college  is  to  be  built  at  Abingdon,  in  Maryland,  on  a  healthy  spot, 
enjoying  a  fine  air  and  a  very  extensive  prospect.  It  is  to  receive, 
for  education  and  board,  the  sons  of  the  elders  and  preachers  of  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  poor  orphans,  and  the  sons  of  the  sub- 
scribers and  other  friends.  It  will  be  expected  that  all  our  friends 
who  send  their  children  to  the  college  will,  if  they  be  able,  pay  a 
moderate  sum  for  their  education  and  board.  The  others  will  be  taught 
and  boarded,  and  if  our  finances  allow  it  clothed,  gratis.  The  institu- 
tion is  aho  intended  for  the  benefit  of  our  young  men  who  are  called 
to  preach,  that  they  may  receive  a  measure  of  that  imi)rovement  which 
is  highly  expedient  as  a  preparation  for  public  service.  A  teacher  of  an- 
cient languages,  with  an  assistant,  Avill  be  provided,  as  also  an  English 
master  to  teach  the  English  language  ;  nor  shall  any  other  branch  of 
literature  be  omitted  which  may  be  thought  necessary  for  any  of  the 
students.  Above  all,  especial  care  shall  be  taken  that  due  attention 
be  paid  to  the  religion  and  morals  of  the  children,  and  to  the  exclusion 
of  all  such  as  continue  of  an  ungovernable  temper.  The  college  will 
be  under  the  presidentship  of  the  Bishops  of  our  Church  for  the  time 
being,  and  is  to  be  supported  by  yearly  collections  throughout  our  cir- 
cuits, and  any  endowments  which  our  friends  may  think  proper  to  give 
and  bequeath.  Three  objects  of  considerable  magnitude  we  have  in 
view  in  the  instituting  of  this  college.  The  first  is,  a  provision  for  the 
sons  of  our  married  ministers  and  preachers.  The  wisdom,  of  God  hath 
now  thrust  out  a  large  number  of  laborers  into  his  harvest — men  who 
desire  nothing  on  earth  but  to  promote  the  glory  of  God  by  saving 
their  own  souls  and  the  souls  of  those  wlio  hear  them.  And  those 
to  whom  they  minister  spiritual  things  are  willing  to  minister  to  them 
their  temporal  things  ;  so  that  they  have  food  to  eat  and  raiment  to 
put  on,  and  are  content  therewith.  A  competent  provision  is  like- 
wise made  for  the  wives  of  married  preachers.  Yet  one  considerable 
difficulty  lies  on  those  who  have  boys,  when  they  grow  too  big  to  be 
under  their  mother's  direction.  Having  no  father  to  govern  and  di- 
rect them,  they  are  exposed  to  a  thousand  temptations.  To  remedy 
this  is  one  motive  that  induces  us  to  lay  before  our  friends  the  interest 


CoKESBUKY  College.  23 

of  the  college,  that  these  little  ones  may  have  all  the  instruction  they 
are  capable  of,  together  with  all  things  necessary  for  the  body. 

In  this  view  our  college  will  become  one  of  the  noblest  charities  that 
can  be  conceived.  How  reasonable  is  the  institution !  Is  it  fit  that  the 
children  of  those  who  leave  wife  and  all  that  is  dear  to  save  souls  from 
death  should  want  what  is  needful  for  either  soul  or  body  ?  Ought 
we  not  to  supply  what  the  parent  cannot,  because  of  his  labors  in  the 
Gospel  ?  How  excellent  will  be  the  effect  of  this  institution !  The 
preacher,  eased  of  this  weight,  can  the  more  cheerfully  go  on  in  his 
labor.  And  perliaps  many  of  these  children  may  hereafter  fill  up  the 
places  of  those  who  shall  rest  from  their  labors. 

The  second  object  we  have  in  view  is  the  education  and  support  of 
poor  orphans  ;  and  surely  we  need  not  enumerate  the  many  happy  con- 
sequences arising  from  such  a  charity.  Innumerable  blessings  con- 
center in  it;  not  only  the  immediate  relief  of  the  objects  of  our  charity, 
but  the  ability  given  them  under  the  providence  of  God  to  provide  for 
themselves  through  the  remainder  of  their  lives. 

Tlie  last,  though  not  perhaps  the  least,  object  in  view,  is  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  seminary  for  the  children  of  our  competent  friends, 
where  learning  and  religion  may  go  hand  in  hand  ;  where  every 
advantage  may  be  obtained  which  may  promote  the  prosperity  of  the 
present  life  without  endangering  the  morals  and  religion  of  the  chil- 
dren tlu-ough  those  temptations  to  which  they  are  exposed  in  most  of 
the  public  schools.  This  is  an  object  of  importance,  indeed,  and  here 
all  the  tenderest  feelings  of  the  parent's  heart  range  on  our  side. 

But  the  expense  of  such  an  undertaking  will  be  very  large;  and  the 
best  means  we  could  think  of  at  our  late  Conference  to  accomplish  our 
design  was,  to  desire  the  assistance  of  all  those  in  every  place  who  wish 
well  to  the  cause  of  God:  who  long  to  see  sinners  converted  to  God,  and 
the  kingdom  of  Christ  set  up  in  all  the  earth. 

All  those  who  are  thus  minded,  and  more  especially  our  own  friends 
who  form  our  congregations,  have  an  opportunity  now  of  showing  their 
love  to  the  Gospel.  Now  promote,  as  far  as  in  you  lies,  one  of  the 
noblest  charities  in  the  world.  Now  forward,  as  you  are  able,  one  of 
the  most  excellent  designs  that  ever  was  set  on  foot  in  this  country. 
Do  what  you  can  to  comfort  the  parents  who  give  up  their  all  for  you, 
and  to  give  their  children  cause  to  bless  you.     You  will  be  no  poorer 


24  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

for  what  you  do  on  such  an  occasion.  God  is  a  good  paymaster.  And 
you  know  in  doing  this  you  lend  unto  the  Lord ;  in  due  time  he  shall 
repay  you. 

The  students  will  be  instructed  in  English,  Latin,  Greek,  logic, 
rhetoric,  history,  geography,  natural  philosophy,  and  astronomy.  To 
these  languages  and  sciences  shall  be  added,  when  the  finances  of  our 
college  will  admit  of  it,  the  Hebrew,  French,  and  German  languages. 

But  our  first  object  shall  be  to  answer  the  designs  of  Christian  educa- 
tion, by  forming  the  minds  of  the  youth,  through  divine  aid,  to  wisdom 
and  holiness,  by  instilling  into  their  minds  the  principles  of  true  relig- 
ion— speculative,  experimental,  and  practical — and  training  them  in  the 
ancient  way,  that  they  may  be  rational,  spiritual  Christians.  For  this 
purpose  we  shall  expect  and  enjoin  it,  not  only  on  the  president  and 
tutors,  but  also  upon  our  elders,  deacons,  and  preachers,  to  embrace 
every  opportunity  of  instructing  the  students  in  the  great  branches  of 
the  Christian  religion. 

And  this  is  one  principal  reason  why  we  do  not  admit  students  indis- 
criminately into  our  college.  For  we  are  persuaded  that  the  pi'omiscu- 
ous  admission  of  all  sorts  of  youth  into  a  seminary  of  learning  is  preg- 
nant with  many  bad  consequences.  Nor  are  the  students  likely  (sup- 
pose they  possessed  it)  to  retain  much  religion  in  a  college  where  all  that 
offer  are  admitted,  however  corrupted  already  in  principle,  as  well  as 
practice.  And  what  wonder  when  (as  too  frequently  it  hapj^ens),  the 
l^arents  themselves  have  no  more  religion  than  their  offspring  ? 

For  the  same  reason  we  have  consented  to  receive  children  of  seven 
years  of  age,  as  we  wish  to  have  the  opportunity  of  teaching  ' '  the  young 
idea  how  to  shoot,"  and  gradually  forming  their  minds,  through  the 
divine  blessing,  almost  from  their  infancy,  to  holiness  and  heavenly 
wisdom  as  well  as  human  learning.  And  we  may  add,  that  we  arc 
thoroughly  convinced,  with  the  great  Milton  (to  whose  admirable  treat- 
ise on  education  we  refer  you),  that  it  is  highly  expedient  for  every 
youth  to  begin  and  finish  his  education  at  the  same  place ;  that  nothing 
can  be  more  irrational  and  absurd  than  to  break  this  off  in  the  middle 
and  to  begin  it  again  at  a  different  place,  and,  perhaps,  in  quite  a 
different  manner.  And  on  this  account  we  earnestly  desire  that  the 
parents  and  others  who  may  be  concerned,  will  maturely  consider  the 
last  observation,  and  not  send  their  children  to  our  seminary  if  they  are 


CoKESBURY  College.  25 

not  to  complete  their  education  there,  or  at  least  make  some  consider- 
able [)roficiency  in  the  languages  and  in  the  arts  and  sciences.  It  is 
also  our  particular  desire  that  all  who  shall  be  educated  in  our  college 
may  be  kept  at  the  utmost  distance,  as  from  vice  in  general,  so  in  par- 
ticular from  softness  and  effeminacy  of  manners. 

We  shall,  therefore,  rigidly  insist  on  their  rising  early  in  the  morn- 
ing; and  we  are  convinced,  by  constant  observation  and  experience, 
that  it  is  of  vast  importance  both  to  body  and  mind.  It  is  of  ad- 
mirable use  either  for  preserving  a  good,  and  improving  a  bad,  consti- 
tution. It  is  also  of  peculiar  service  in  all  nervous  complaints,  both  in 
preventing  and  in  removing  them.  And  by  thus  strengthening  the 
various  organs  of  the  body  it  enables  the  mind  to  put  forth  its  utmost 
exertions. 

On  the  same  principle  we  prohibit  play  in  the  strongest  terms;  and 
in  this  we  have  the  two  greatest  writers  on  the  subject  that,  perhaps, 
any  age  has  produced  (Mr.  Locke  and  Mr.  Rousseau)  of  our  sentiments ; 
for  though  the  latter  was  essentially  mistaken  in  his  religious  system, 
yet  his  wisdom  in  other  respects,  and  extensive  genius,  are  indisputably 
acknowledged.  The  employments,  therefore,  which  we  have  chosen 
for  the  recre  ition  of  the  students,  are  such  as  are  of  greatest  public 
utility — agriculture  and  architecture;  studies  more  especially  neces- 
sary for  a  new-settled  country,  and  of  consequence  the  interesting  of 
our  youth  in  the  practice  of  those  important  arts  will  be  an  effectual 
method  of  rendering  them  useful  to  their  country.  Agreeably  to  this 
i<lea,  the  greatest  statesman  that  perhaps  ever  shone  in  the  annals  of 
history,  Peter,  the  Russian  emperor,  who  was  deservedly  styled  the 
Greaty  disdained  not  to  stoop  to  the  employment  of  a  ship-carpenter. 
Kor  was  it  rare,  dining  the  i)urest  times  of  the  Roman  republic,  to  see 
the  compierors  of  nations  and  deliverers  of  their  country  return  with 
all  simplicity  and  cheerfulness  to  the  exercise  of  the  plow.  In  con- 
formity to  this  sentiment,  one  of  the  completest  poetic  pieces  of  antiquity 
(the  Georgics  of  Virgil)  is  written  on  the  subject  of  husbandry,  by  the 
perusal  of  which,  and  submission  to  the  above  regulations,  the  students 
may  delightfully  unite  the  theory  and  practice  together.  We  say 
delightfully,  for  we  do  not  entertain  the  most  distant  thought  of  turn- 
ing these  employments  into  drudgery  or  slavery,  but  into  pleasing  rec- 
reations for  the  mind  and  the  body. 
2 


26  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

In  teaching  the  languages,  care  shall  be  taken  to  read  those  authors, 
and  those  only,  who  join  together  the  purity,  strength,  and  the  ele- 
gance of  their  several  tongues.  And  the  utmost  caution  shall  be  used 
that  nothing  immodest  be  found  in  any  of  our  books.  But  this  is  not 
all.  We  shall  take  care  that  our  books  be  not  only  inoffensive  but  use- 
ful ;  that  they  contain  as  much  strong  sense,  and  as  much  genuine  mo- 
rality as  possible.  As  far,  therefore,  as  is  consistent  with  the  foregoing 
observations,  a  choice  and  universal  library  shall  be  provided  for  the 
use  of  the  students. 

Our  annual  subscription  is  intended  for  the  support  of  the  charitable 
part  of  the  institution.  We  have  in  the  former  part  of  this  address  en- 
larged so  fully  on  the  nature  and  excellency  of  the  charity,  that  no 
more  need  be  said.  The  relieving  our  traveling  ministers  and  preach- 
ers, by  educating,  boarding,  and  clothing  their  sons,  is  a  charity  of  the 
most  noble  and  extensive  kind,  not  only  toward  the  immediate  objects 
of  it,  but  also  toward  the  public  in  general;  enabling  those  ''flames  of 
fire,"  who  might  otherwise  be  obliged  to  confine  themselves  to  an  ex- 
ceedingly contracted  sphere  of  action  for  the  support  of  their  families, 
to  carry  the  savor  of  the  Gospel  to  the  remotest  corners  of  these  United 
States. 

The  four  guineas  a  year  for  tuition,  we  arc  persuaded,  cannot  be  low- 
ered, if  we  give  the  students  that  finished  education  which  we  are  de- 
termined they  shall  have.  And,  though  our  principal  object  is  to 
instruct  them  in  the  doctrines,  spirit,  and  practice  of  Christianity,  yet 
w^e  trust  that  our  college  will  in  time  send  forth  men  that  will  be  a 
blessing  to  their  country  in  every  laudable  ofilce  and  employment  of 
life,  thereby  uniting  the  two  greatest  ornaments  of  human  beings, 
which  are  too  often  separated,  dee])  learning  and  genuine  piety. 

To  modern  teachers  arid  parents  tlie  regnlalions  of  tlie  col- 
lege will  probably  seem  rigid,  and  even  harsh  ;  but  the  rights 
of  tlie  students  were  so  guarded  that  under  them  cruel  treat- 
ment could  scarcely  occur.  It  should  be  remembered  that  they 
were  to  be  executed  by  men  of  large  experience,  great  self- 
control,  and  who  sought  only  the  glory  of  God,  and  the  best 
interests,  for  time  and  eternity,  of  those  committed  to  their 


CoKESBUKY  College.  27 

care.  The  Bisliops  for  the  time  being,  when  present,  were 
ex  officio  the  chief  executive  officers. 

A  similar  code,  in  many  of  its  provisions,  in  our  modern 
schools,  seminaries,  and  colleges,  with  the  vast  improvements 
of  later  years  in  text-books  and  methods  of  teaching,  illus- 
trating, and  demonstrating  scientific  truths,  would  result  in 
a  much  larger  per  cent,  of  well-developed  and  highly  culti- 
vated minds  in  good,  sound,  healthy  bodies,  than  are  now 
turned  out  from  our  literary  institutions  of  various  grades. 

With  twenty-five  hundred  dollars  cash  in  hand  the  founda- 
tion of  the  edifice  was  commenced,  and  the  structure  pro- 
gressed to  completion  by  the  help  of  funds  secured  princi- 
pally by  the  Bishops  as  they  passed  over  the  country,  every- 
where inviting  the  people  to  come  to  the  aid  of  the  noble 
undertaking.  And  considering  the  then  comparative  poverty 
of  the  people,  and  more  especially  the  poverty  of  the  Meth- 
odist people,  the  response  to  the  venerable  chief  pastors  was 
unprecedentedly  generous.  The  college  edifice  was  one  hun- 
dred and  eight  feet  long,  forty  feet  wide,  and  three  stories 
higli.  In  the  west  end  of  the  building  were  six  fine  rooms, 
each  twenty  by  twenty-five  feef ;  two  of  these  were  in  the 
lower,  two  in  the  second,  and  two  in  the  third  story,  directly 
above  each  other.  On  the  first  floor  was  a  large  room  forty 
feet  square,  it  was  called  the  college  hall,  used  for  chapel  pur- 
poses. Above  this,  on  the  second  floor,  were  two  fine  class- 
rooms, and  over  these  two  bedrooms,  in  which  the  students 
lodged  in  single  beds ;  each  room  was  also  occupied  by  a  pro- 
fessor, who  preserved  order  at  night.  The  other  end  of  the 
edifice  was  arranged  according  to  plans  having  reference  to 
the  accommodation  of  a  large  boarding-school. 

It  cost  upward  of  forty  thousand  dollars,  nearly  all  collected 
in  small  sums  from  a  widely  scattered  people.     To  appreciate 


28  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

liow  lieavj  was  the  burden  tbat  the  generous  people  under- 
took to  carry,  it  should  be  remembered  that  the  entire  mem- 
bership of  the  Methodist  Cliurch  in  America  was  but  about 
eighteen  thousand.  The  Genesee  Conference  alone  reported 
for  the  year  1884  over  twenty-five  thousand  members,  and 
it  had  more  than  twice  that  number  of  friends  and  liberal 
supporters. 

In  his  Journal,  vol.  i,  page  497,  the  venerable  Bishop  As- 
bury  makes  this  entry  :  "  I  rode  to  Abingdon  to  preacli  the 
foundation  sermon  of  Cokesbury  College."  His  biographer 
describes  the  scene:  ''Attired  in  his  long  silk  gown,  and  his 
clerical  bands  floating  in  the  breeze,  the  Bishop  took  his  stand 
on  the  foundation  wall  and  read  from  the  seventy-eighth  Psalm 
as  a  text,  '  I  will  utter  dark  sayings  of  old  :  which  we  have 
heard  and  known,  and  our  fathers  have  told  us.  We  will  not 
liida  them  from  their  children,  showing  to  the  generation  to 
come  the  praises  of  the  Lord,  and  his  strengtli,  and  his  wonder- 
ful works  that  he  hath  done.  For  he  established  a  testimony 
in  Jacob,  and  appointed  a  law  in  Israel,  which  he  commanded 
our  fathers,  that  they  should  make  tliem  known  to  their  chil- 
dren :  that  the  generation  to  come  might  know  them,  even 
the  children  which  should  be  born  ;  who  should  arise  and  de- 
clare them  to  their  children  :  that  they  might  set  their  hope 
in  God,  and  not  forget  the  works  of  God,  but  keep  his  com- 
mandments." The  text  was  strikingly  appropriate,  and  char- 
acteristic of  the  venerable  preacher.  The  Journal  adds  :  "  I 
had  liberty  in  speaking  and  faith  to  believe  that  the  work 
would  go  on." 

A  little  more  than  two  years  later  the  Bishop  is  at  Abing- 
don, to  open  the  college.  He  says,  Deceniber  6,  1787: 
"We  opened  the  college,  and  admitted  twenty-five  students. 
I  preached  on  the  text,  '  Trust  in  the  Lord,  and  do  good.' 


CoKESBURY  College.  29 

On  Sabbath  following  I  spoke  on,  '  O  man  of  God,  there  is 
death  in  the  pot.'  "  The  text  and  sermon  were  most  remark- 
able, and  the  tradition  is,  that  in  the  minds  of  the  old  Meth- 
odists they  presaged  the  sad  fate  that  awaited  the  college  so 
auspiciously  opened ;  it  was  consumed  by  an  incendiary  fire 
just  at  tlie  close  of  a  career  of  ten  years.  Great  hostility  to 
tlie  institution  manifested  itself  from  the  first. 

In  less  than  a  year  after  the  school  opened,  the  good  Bishop 
wrote  in  his  Journal,  November  19,  1788 :  "  In  times  past 
I  have  felt  some  disagreeable  impressions  about  the  college 
being  burnt.  Now  I  have  heard  of  an  attempt  to  do  it." 
Nine  years  later  his  fears  were  sadly  realized  ;  the  noble  edi- 
fice, with  its  fine  library,  collected  in  Europe  and  America, 
was  consumed ;  a  loss  of  about  fifty  thousand  dollars.  In  his 
sadness  at  the  great  loss,  the  old  Bishop  concluded  that  at  that 
time  '"the  Lord  did  not  call  tlie  Methodists  to  build  colleires." 

Brief  as  was  the  career  of  Cokesbury  College,  always 
under  pressure  for  want  of  money  to  carry  it  on,  at  one  time 
so  pressed  to  meet  current  expenses  that  Bisliop  Asbury 
wxMit  from  door  to  door  through  tlie  streets  of  Baltimore 
begging  money  to  support  "  the  charity  boys  at  the  college," 
it  accomplished  some  good  work ;  hovv  much,  we  shall  not 
know,  as  its  records  were  destroyed  with  its  library  in 
the  burning  of  the  building.  As  soon  as  the  edifice  was 
inclosed,  and  one  room  made  ready  for  use,  a  preparatory 
school  was  opened,  under  the  instruction  of  a  good  classical 
scholar,  Mr.  Freeman  Marsh.  Early  steps  were  taken  to 
secure  from  England  a  well-qualified  gentleman  to  tiike  the 
actual  presidency  of  the  college.  Bishop  Asbury  was, 
according  to  the  rules  for  its  government,  the  nominal,  and 
when  present  the  real,  president.  Mr.  Wesley  recommended 
for   the  presidency  a   Bev.  Mr.   Heath,  a  minister  of  the 


30  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Cliurcli  of  England,  who  in  due  time  was  elected  to  that 
office  by  the  board  of  trustees.  At  the  same  meeting  Pat- 
rick M'Closky  and  Mr.  Marsh  were  chosen  professors. 

August  10,  1788,  Bishop  Asbury  made  this  entry  in  his 
Journal :  "  I  received  heavy  tidings  from  the  college — both 
teachers  have  left.  One  for  incompetency,  and  the  other  to 
pursue  riches  and  honors ;  had  they  cost  us  nothing,  the  mis- 
take we  made  in  employing  them  might  be  the  less  regretted." 
The  college  had  probably  borne  the  expense  of  one  of  them, 
perhaps  both,  from  England  to  America.  It  is  perhaps  due 
that  an  explanation  should  be  given  of  the  causes  of  the  sud- 
den departure  of  these  two  teachers  from  Cokesbury.  Mr. 
Heath's  duties,  as  a  clergyman,  had  not  required  him  to  keep 
read  up  in  the  higher  Latin  studies.  In  the  temporary 
absence  of  the  professor  of  languages  he  was  called  upon  to 
hear  a  class  in  Latin,  for  which,  off-hand,  he  was  not  pre- 
pared. The  report  w^ent  out  at  once  that  he  was  not  a  com- 
petent teacher.  He  resented  the  insinuation,  and  resigned 
his  office.  He  enjoyed  the  confidence  and  respect  of  Mr. 
"Wesley,  who,  as  a  token  of  his  affection,  left  Mr.  Heath,  in 
liis  will,  three  hundred  dollars.  Professor  M'Closky  left 
the  college  to  carry  on  his  farm  in  the  vicinity.  The  change 
of  teachers  did  not  seriously  interrupt  the  institution.  Dr. 
Jacob  Hall  became  the  president,  Hev.  Joseph  Toy  and  Kev. 
John  Hargrove  were  elected  professors,  and  Mr.  Tait  teacher 
of  French.  It  would  be  a  great  pleasure  to  know  who 
among  the  students  during  the  ten  years,  numbering  fi'om 
thirty  to  eighty  most  of  the  time,  became  distinguished  in 
any  of  the  walks  of  useful  life  as  the  result  of  the  advan- 
tages enjoyed  at  Cokesbury.  A  few  names  are  known. 
Bishop  Asbury  mentions  a  son  of  Abel  Bliss,  of  Wilbra- 
liam,   Mass.,   who  "was  educated — not  spoiled — at   Cokes- 


CoKESDURY  College.  31 

bury."  *  Another  was  Col.  AVillhim  Donglity,  of  Pliiladcl- 
pliia,  who  distinguished  himself  in  the  United  States  Navy. 
Sanmel  AVhite,  the  son  of  the  Bishop's  old  friend  in  Dela- 
ware, was  another;  he  tilled  for  one  term  a  seat  in  the 
United  States  Senate.  Asbury  Dickens,  another  student, 
was  for  many  years  the  secretary  of  the  United  States 
Senate.  The  most  distinguished  alumnus  of  Cokesbury  was 
tlie  pioneer  preacher  and  teacher,  as  well  as  the  heroic  pre- 
siding elder,  Rev.  Valentine  Cook,  whose  district  included 
the  whole  State  of  Kentucky. 

At  one  time  the  college  .had  on  its  Hst  about  one  hundred 
students,  representatives  from  the  best  Methodist  families  in 
the  nation ;  the  spirit  of  revival  was  among  them,  and  many 
of  them  were  brought  to  a  saving  acquaintance  with  Christ. 
Rev.  Joseph  Everett  was  for  some  years  in  charge  of  the 
religious  services  of  the  college,  holding,  by  appointment  of 
the  trustees,  the  office  of  chaplain.  The  Southern  States 
were,  for  a  few  years,  quite  largely  represented  by  studeuts 
who  went  to  Cokesbury  to  complete  their  education. 

As  to  the  work  dune  at  Cokesbury,  and  what,  with  the 
active  co-operation  of  the  Church,  could  have  been  done, 
Bishop  Asbury,  in  a  letter  to  Bishop  Coke,  then  in  England, 
expresses  himself  thus: 

"If  it  were  not  for  the  suspicions  of  some,  and  the  pride 
;nul  ignorance  of  others,  I  am  of  opinion  I  could  make  provis- 
ion, by  collections,  profits  on  books,  and  donations  in  land,  to 
take  two  thousand  children  under  the  best  plan  of  education 

*  This  son  of  Abel  Bliss,  whose  name  was  also  Abel,  became  one  of  the 
most  active  and  inliuciuisil  members  of  the  bonrd  of  trustees  of  the  Wesley.m 
Ac.ulemy  at  Wilbraham,  Mass.,  and  liisdan.;htor,  Miss  N.uicy  Biis'^,  beoam? 
the  first  proccptrcss  of  the  Cazenovia  Seminary. 


32  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

ever  known  in  tliis  coiintrv.  The  Lord  begins  to  smile  on  our 
Kings  wood  (Cokesbury)  School.  One  promising  young  man 
has  gone  forth  into  the  ministry,  another  is  ready,  and  sev- 
eral have  been  under  awakenings,  l^one  so  healthy  and 
orderly  as  our  children,  and  some  promise  great  talents  for 
learning.  The  obstinate  and  ignorant  oppose,  among  preach- 
ers and  people ;  while  the  judicious,  for  good  sense  and  piety, 
in  Chiych  and  State,  admire  and  applaud. 

"I  am,  with  most  dutiful  respect,  as  ever,  your  son  in  the 
Gospel.  Fkancis  Asbury." 

THE   SECOND   cokesbury. 

The  fallen  walls  of  Cokesbury  at  Abingdon  were  scarcely 
cold  when  the  noble  Baltimore  Methodists,  at  an  expense  of 
about  twenty  thousand  dollars,  purchased  an  eligible  lot  ad- 
joining that  on  which  the  old  Light  Street  Church  stood,  hav- 
ing on  it  a  large  brick  building,  which,  with  some  modifica- 
tions, was  found  well  adapted  to  school  purposes. 

Here  the  second  Cokesbury,  as  in  history  it  is  known, 
opened  even  more  auspiciously  than  the  first  at  Abingdon. 
Kev.  Joseph  Toy,  who  was  one  of  the  professors  in  the  first, 
lield  the  same  ofiice,  professor  of  mathematics,  in  the  second 
Cokesbury.  Bishop  Asbury,  never  quite  in  favor  of  calling 
these  schools  colleges,  in  several  instances  in  his  Journal 
mentions  this  institution  as  "  the  Academy."  in  which  he  often 
preached. 

June  22,  1796,  he  wrote  in  his  Journal :  "I  borrowed  a 
horse  and  made  out  to  get  to  Baltimore.  O  what  times  are 
here !  The  academy  is  crowded ;  they  have  five  teachers 
and  nearly  two  hundred  scholars." 

How  strange  and  sad  to  relate,  on  the  4th  of  December, 
1796,  just  one  year  after  the  destruction  of  the  first,  this 


CoKESBURY  College.  33 

second  Methodist  college  was  destroyed  by  fire,  resulting, 
in  this  instance,  from  the  carelessness  of  some  sport-loving 
boys. 

Bishop  Asbury  makes  this  entry  in  his  Journal :  "  Serious 
news  from  Baltimore ;  the  academy  and  our  church  in  Light 
Street,  with  Brother  Hawkins's  elegant  house,  all  destroyed 
by  fire.  The  loss  we  sustain  in  the  college,  academy,  and 
church  I  estimate  from  fifteen  to  twenty  thousand  pounds : 
but  I  conclude  God  loveth  the  people  of  Baltimore,  and  will 
keep  them  poor,  to  keep  them  pure." 

These  boys  were  amusing  themselves  with  bonfires  in  a 
vacant  building  in  the  neighborhood  ;  the  building  took  fire, 
it  soon  communicated  to  the  college  and  to  Light  Street 
Church,  both  on  the  same  lot,  and  both  were  consumed. 
The  late  Kev.  Isaac  Cook,  D.D.,  my  authority  for  these  state- 
ments, said  :  *'  My  parents  were  present  in  the  church  at  the 
time  of  the  fire.  Rev.  Henry  Willis  was  preaching  a  funeral 
discourse  for  Mr.  Patrick  Calvers.  In  the  midst  of  tlie  sad 
service  the  congregation  were  startled  by  the  cry  of  fire! 
'  The  church  is  on  fire !  bear  away  your  dead  ! '  which  was 
quickly  done.  The  fire  that  destroyed  the  college  and  the 
church  also  destroyed  the  residence  of  the  presiding  elder  of 
Baltimore  District,  and  the  fine  mansion  of  that  liberal  Meth- 
odist, William  Hawkins." 

Under  these  rapidly  succeeding  calamities  the  work  of 
building  Methodist  colleges  was  necessarily  suspended  for  a 
few  years.  The  whole  energies  of  the  Church,  and  all  avail- 
able means,  were  re(pired  to  provide  houses  of  worship  for 
the  vastly-increasing  congregations  east,  west,  north,  and 
south  eager  to  hear  the  message  of  salvation  as  proclaimed 
by  the  Methodist  itinerants:  but  the  work  of  education  was 
by  no  nieans  abandoned.     Some  of  our  writers  speak  of  this 


34  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

as  Asburj  College.     Asbury  College  came  into  being  twenty- 
years  later. 

Bishop  Asbnry  returned  to  his  early  and  favorite  scheme 
of  establishing  his  celebrated  district  schools  in  all  parts  of 
the  country,  not  already  provided  with  schools,  to  which  the 
youth  of  Methodist  families  might  repair  for  instruction  in 
the  higher  branches  of  learning.  Some  of  these  became  good 
classical  academies,  and  accomplished  much  good  work  for 
the  country  and  for  the  Church,  and  prepared  the  Church  for 
the  educational  era  that  opened  with  the  session  of  tlie  Gen- 
eral Conference  of  1820. 


Ebenezee  Academy.  35 


CHAPTER  III. 

EBENEZER  ACADEMY,  VIRGINIA. 

Bishop  Asbury  had  an  especial  partiality  for  Bible  names. 
Two  of  the  principal  schools  founded  by  him,  or  through  his 
agency,  were  called  Betliel— the  house  of  God.  Many  of  the 
churches  consecrated  by  him  most  appropriately  bore  the 
same  name. 

Ebenezer — the  stone  of  help — was  the  name  of  churches 
erected  under  his  auspices  in  Korth  Carolina,  South  Caro- 
lina, Tennessee,  and  Kentucky.  In  Virginia  it  was  the 
name  of  an  academy  that  absorbed  mucli  of  his  care,  and 
largely  engrossed  his  labors.  The  full  measure  of  success 
that  it  enjoyed,  or  work  that  it  accomplished,  we  shall  never 
be  able  to  understand ;  that  it  did  good  work  for  a  period 
of  at  least  twenty-five  years  will  be  seen  as  we  advance.  Its 
greatest  value  to  us  is,  that  it  helps  to  illnsti-ate  the  great 
zeal  of  the  pioneer  Bishop  in  the  cause  of  denominational 
education  ;  a  zeal  too  ardent  to  be  quenched  by  the  greatest 
disasters,  or  diverted  from  its  true  objects — the  glory  of  God 
and  the  good  of  man — by  any  amount  of  jealousy,  misappre- 
hension, or  aspersion  of  motives  that  were  as  pure  as  ever 
l)rompted  human  action.  That  ambition  was  not  his  guiding 
star  is  shown  by  the  absence  of  all  means  to  magnify  or  even 
make  known  his  achievements.  How  much  we  wish  that  of 
this  achievement — ^Ebenezer  Academy — he  had  left  the  full 
record  of  the  incipient  measures  for  its  establishment,  tlie 
list  of  the  names  of  those  who  aided  in  planning,  and  more 
especially  in  executing,  the  plans  that  brought  into  being  this 


36  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

important  agency  of  early  Methodism.  No  record  of  the  ex- 
act time  of  the  erection  of  the  massive  stone  building,  or  of 
the  opening  of  the  school,  will  ever  come  to  light.  It  was 
only  incidentally  that  he  gave  the  location  of  the  institution 
as  having  been  in  Brunswick  County,  Yirginia;  but  in  what 
part  of  that  large,  old  county,  he  left  us  but  very  vague,  if 
any,  means  of  even  inferring.  Less  than  a  half-dozen  very 
brief  mentions  in  his  invaluable  Journal  is  all  that  tlie 
great  evangelist  left  of  this  undertaking  that  rested  so  heav- 
ily as  a  burden  upon  his  heart  for  long  years.  So  brief  and 
modest  were  the  Bishop's  notices  of  Ebenezer  Academy,  that 
our  veteran  historian.  Dr.  Nathan  Bangs,  overlooked  it.  This 
is  a  misfortune,  as  he  wrote  at  so  early  a  period  that  infor- 
mation concerning  it  might  easily  have  been  gained.  Yery 
different  now !  The  witnesses,  like  the  principal  actor,  have 
gone.  Lee's  history  mentions  it,  but  not  until  its  best  days 
were  passed. 

It  was  located  near  Merritt's  meeting-house,  in  which 
Bishop  Asbury  often  preached,  in  the  southern  part  of 
Brunswick  County,  Yirgina,  on  the  road  leading  from  Peters- 
burg to  Boydton,  the  latter,  in  after  years,  noted  as  the  seat 
of  Eandolph-Macon  College,  in  which,  for  a  few  years,  the 
late  Stephen  Olin,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  was  president.  Brunswick 
County  will  be  remembered  as  the  center  of  that  wonderful 
visitation  of  the  Spirit  that  swept  over  southern  Yirginia 
soon  after  the  close  of  tlie  War  of  the  Revolution  and  the 
establishment  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  at  the 
Christmas  General  Conference  of  178L  James  O'Kelly, 
then  the  presiding  elder  of  the  district,  made  this  repoi't  of 
the  wonderful  work  of  the  Lord : 

"  Old  Brunswick  and  Surry  Circuits  exceed  any  thing  I 
ever  saw  or  heard  of  in  America.     I  believe  that  six  thou- 


Ebenezeu  Acai)p:mv.  37 


sand  were  assembled  together  at  the  quarterly  meeting  held, 
a  few  days  ago,  for  Brunswick  Circuit." 

Rev.  Philip  Cox,  one  of  the  circuit  preachers,  evidently 
under  great  excitement,  exclaimed,  "Great  news  from  Zion  !  " 

And  the  future  Book  Agent  of  Methodism,  the  learned 
and  greatly  pious  John  Dickins,  wrote :  "  It  is  estimated  that 
about  Brunswick  itself  not  less  than  seven  thousand  souls 
are  under  deep  convictions." 

Mr.  Cox  said  :  "  Never  was  there  before  so  great  a  work  of 
God  in  America  as  is  now  in  the  Brunswick  and  Surry 
Circuits." 

This  favorable  condition  of  the  public  mind  and  conscience 
Bishop  Asbury  improved  to  secure  the  co-operation  and 
pecuniary  aid  of  the  inhabitants  of  Brunswick  and  adjacent 
counties,  in  Yii-ginia  and  North  Carolina,  in  planting  on  a 
firm  basis  an  institution  of  learning  for  the  benefit  of  that 
and  of  future  generations  of  youth  in  that  portion  of  his  great 
pastoral  charge. 

It  is  claimed  by  some  of  tlie  old  Methodists  of  that  region 
that  Ebenezer  was  the  first  Methodist  school  opened  in  Amer- 
ica. Judge  F.  E.  Buford,  of  Brunswick  County,  a  gentle- 
man of  high  standing  in  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church,  to 
whom  I  am  under  especial  obligation,  wrote  me :  "  Though 
I  am  now  forty-nine  years  of  age,  I  am  too  young  to  remem- 
ber any  thing  of  Ebenezer  Academy  as  a  school.  I  have 
known  the  building,  which  is  a  stone  structure  of  peculiar 
design,  as  *  Old  Ebenezer  '  for  a  number  of  years ;  but  when  I 
first  saw  it,  fully  forty  years  ago,  it  had  ceased  to  be  used  as 
an  academy." 

In  a  subsequent  letter  he  wrote  :  "  I  made  an  effort  to  find 
out  when  Ebenezer  Academy  was  chartered ;  and  with  that 
view  I  spent  a  day  at  our  county-seat  in  examining  the  rec- 


38  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

ords,  both  before  and  after  tlie  establisliment  of  our  national 
independence;  but  I  could  find  no  mention  of  it  in  any  of 
our  statistics.  I  am,  however,  fully  satisfied,  from  the  best 
information  I  have  been  able  to  get,  that  it  was  established 
between  the  years  lYSO  and  1784"  He  says  further:  "I 
wrote  to  several  of  the  oldest  citizens  of  the  county  for  their 
recollections,  or  for  facts  that  came  to  them  well  authen- 
ticated. Several  of  them  responded  that  the  school  opened 
at  quite  an  early  day,  and  that  they  thought  that  what  the 
oldest  of  them  knew  of  the  school  in  its  palmiest  days  was 
but  *  hearsay.'  T  addressed  inquiries  to  W.  Embry  Mer- 
ritt,  Esq.,  an  aged  Methodist,  attorn ey-at-law,  after  whose 
father.  Rev.  Henry  Merritt,  the  church  in  the  neighborhood 
was  called  *  Merritt's  Chapel.'  My  letter  found  him  on  a  bed 
of  sickness  and  death.  He  died  in  April,  1885.  He  re- 
quested his  daughter.  Miss  Jennie  Merritt,  to  respond  to  my 
letter.  Among  other  items,  he  told  her  to  inform  me  that 
the  school  opened  in  1784.  His  father,  Eev.  Henry  Merritt, 
was  one  of  the  first  board  of  trustees,  and  an  active  assistant 
to  Bishop  Asbury  in  building  up  the  school.  His  son,  who 
said  that  the  institution  opened  in  1784,  was  educated  at  the 
academy,  but  as  he  was  not  born  until  1796,  his  connection 
with  tlie  school  must  have  been  during  its  last  years.  When 
the  school  in  the  old  stone  building  of  the  Merritt  neighbor- 
liood  closed,  I  have  gained  no  certain  information."  Jesse 
Lee's  history  was  published  in  1809  ;  he  notices  it  as  a  good 
school  then  in  operation.  Putting  together  all  the  facts  gath- 
ered by  Judge  Buford  and  the  statement  of  Esquire  Merritt, 
made  during  his  last  sickness,  and  who,  all  his  life,  had  re- 
sided in  the  neighborhood,  and  had  the  best  of  facilities 
for  knowing  the  facts  in  regard  to  which  he  testified,  I  am 
strongly  inclined  to  the  opinion  that  Ebenezer  Academy,  in 


Ebexezer  Academy.  39 

Brunswick  County,  Virginia,  was  the  first  Metliodist  school 
opened  in  America.  Like  all  others,  whose  opinions  had 
been  published,  until  these  new  facts  reached  me,  I  had  sup- 
posed that  Cokesburj  College,  at  Abingdon,  Maryland,  was 
the  first  American  Methodist  school. 

Bishop  Asbury's  first  mention  in  his  Journal  of  Ebenezer 
Academy  was  dated  December  5,  1794 :  "  Our  burdensome 
stone  Ebenezer  now  gives  us  some  care.  If  we  can  employ 
good  men,  keep  up  discipline,  and  maintain  credit,  it  may 
come  to  something." 

This  language  indicates  that  the  school  had  been  some  time 
in  operation  (according  to  Judge  Merritt,  ten  years),  and  that 
it  had  not  heretofore  met  his  expectations  or  entire  approval. 
"Whether  the  dereliction  was  in  the  trustees,  teachers,  or 
others,  we  can  but  conjecture.  Some  of  the  first  trustees  of 
the  school  were  Kev.  ITenry  Merritt;  Daniel  L.  Mead,  of 
Octagon;  Colonel  Tucker;  Bichard  W.  Field;  others  not 
remembered  by  my  informant.  In  after  years  Rev.  J.  G. 
Cluiborn  was  a  trustee.  lie  is  still  living  in  feebleness  at 
the  age  of  about  eighty-eight  years.  Himself  too  infirm  to 
write,  he  referred  me  to  several  of  the  early  students,  one  at 
least  of  whom  died  too  soon  to  answer  my  inquiries. 

I  learn  that  the  first  principal  of  the  school  was  an 
Irishman  or  a  Scotchman,  concerning  whom  all  I  have 
learned  is,  that  "  he  was  a  great  linguist."  A  good  many  of 
the  teachers  from  Britain  at  an  early  day  were  "  great  lin- 
guists," but  knew  but  little  else.  One  of  my  early  teachers 
was  a  fine  linguist,  but  possessed  of  but  a  small  quantity  of 
practical  good  sense.  He  approached  his  more  practical  wife, 
once  on  a  time,  very  weary  and  in  free  perspiration,  having 
taken  up  and  reversed  the  beans  in  his  garden  that  he  sup- 
posed, by  some  strange  freak  of  nature,  had  come  up  with 


40  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

the  wrong  end  uppermost.  In  the  absence  of  experience,  all, 
perhaps,  would  suppose  that  the  seed  from  which  proceeds 
the  plant  should  remain  buried  in  the  earth,  but  my  first 
teacher,  Billy  Pitt,  found  his  first  bean  crop  in  reverse  order. 
To  a  short,  corpulent  man  it  was  quite  a  task  to  correct  the 
mistake  of  nature. 

Whether  Principal  Johnson,  the  Irish  or  Scotch  linguist  of 
great  skill,  had  failed  in  "  keeping  up  discipline  and  securing 
credit  to  the  school,"  or  whether  these  faults  attached  to  some 
of  his  successors  in  later  years,  no  information  has  been 
gained. 

Among  later  teachers  in  the  school  were  Thomas  Terrell, 
Henry  Clary,  Mr.  Dutton,  John  I.  Grigg,  and  Tompkins  Rice. 
The  following  noted  Virginians  are  named  as  alumni  of 
Ebenezer  Academy :  Judge  W.  H.  E.  Merritt,  a  prominent 
lawyer  and  judge  of  Brunswick  County;  Hon.  H.  K. 
Meade,  years  ago  a  member  of  the  United  States  Congress, 
and  subsequently  United  States  minister  plenipotentiary  to 
the  government  of  Brazil ;  Colonel  Jack  Jones ;  Kichard  R. 
Collier ;  Dr.  Nathan  Booth  ;  Dr.  M'Lean  ;  Dr.  George  Field ; 
John  L.  Wilkins,  and  Dr.  W.  B.  Price,  and  many  more  not 
remembered  by  Colonel  W.  T.  Mason,  who,  through  Judge 
Buford,  kindly  furnished  the  list. 

The  principal  building  is  still  standing;  for  a  description 
of  it  I  am  under  obligation  to  Rev.  W.  W.  Lear,  of  the 
Virginia  Conference,  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church, 
South.  It  is  twenty  by  forty  feet  on  the  ground,  two  stories 
high,  built  of  stone,  with  an  old-fashioned  Dutch  roof, 
drooping  eaves,  projecting  far  down  over  the  sides.  It  was 
so  thoroughly  built  that  until  quite  recently  it  was  a  safe 
family  residence,  though  about  one  hundred  years  old. 
Within  a  few  months,  just  after  a  family  had  vacated  it,  a 


Ebenezer  Academy.  41 

part  of  the  front  wall  fell  in.  If  needed  for  school  purposes, 
one  of  my  correspondents  says,  it  could  be  repaired  and  made 
to  do  service  for  another  hundred  years.  The  fathers,  in 
mind,  morals,  and  physics,  built  well !  The  farm  belong- 
ing to  the  school  contained  fifty -seven  acres  and  a  half 
of  good  tillable  land.  There  were  two  boarding-houses, 
whether  on  the  farm  or  near  it  I  am  not  certain.  One 
was  kept  by  Mrs.  Martha  Eldridge,  formerly  Miss  Fisher ; 
the  other  by  Eichard  W.  Field.  All  the  first  trustees  were 
Methodists. 

On  the  8th  of  December,  1794,  Bishop  Asbury  entered  in 
his  Journal :  "  I  had  a  meeting  with  the  trustees  of  Ebenezer 
Academy ;  matters  are  very  discouraging.  People,  in  gen- 
eral, care  too  little  for  the  education  of  their  children."  A 
little  more  than  a  year  later  he  was  again  at  the  seat  of  Eben- 
ezer Academy.     His  Journal  shows  this  gloomy  entry  ; 

"  Ebenezer  Academy  is  under  poor  regulations,  and,  what 
is  more  than  all,  some  gentlemen  of  Brunswick  County  had 
the  confidence  (assurance)  and  want  of  propriety  to  wish  to 
wrest  it  wholly  out  of  our  hands,  after  we  had  collected 
so  much  money  to  build  it."  All  our  first  Methodist  schools 
were  erected  by  funds  collected  by  the  Bishops.  The  Bishop 
mentions  the  Academy  again,  January  24th,  and  on  the  12th 
of  February  he  wrote  in  his  Journal :  "  I  had  appointed  to 
meet  the  trustees  of  Ebenezer  Academy  at  Brother  Hobb's, 
on  the  north  side  of  the  Meherin.  After  some  conversation 
they  willingly  agreed  to  petition  the  Conference  in  behalf  of 
Ebenezer  Academy  for  an  annual  subscription  to  make  pro- 
vision for  a  man,  at  about  one  hundred  pounds  a  year,  who 
shall  keep  an  English  school  under  our  rules,  with  the  wor- 
ship and  word  of  God."  All  Methodist  schools  of  that  day 
were   under  the  same  general  regulations.     See  rules  for 


42  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Cokesbury  College.  The  Bishops,  when  present,  were, 
ex  officio^  the  presidents  of  the  schools,  had  power  to  con- 
vene the  trustees,  could  expel  students.  They  were  like- 
wise the  agents  for  the  collection  of  the  money  required ; 
they  planned  the  buildings  generally.  In  a  word,  the  bur- 
den of  founding  and  supporting  the  Church  schools  rested 
•upon  them. 

Jesse  Lee's  history,  in  1809,  mentions  this  school  as  in 
operation  at  that  date.  He  states  that  Ebenezer  Academy 
was  still  a  good  school,  but  not  under  the  control  of  the 
Methodist  Church.  That  but  few  of  the  old  trustees  re- 
mained, having  removed  to  other  neighborhoods,  and  of 
those  left  some  were  not  Methodists.  The  teacher,  he  said, 
had  entire  control  of  the  institution,  taking  in  and  removing 
students  at  pleasure. 

The  school  building  and  the  farm,  for  which  the  Bishop 
"  had  collected  so  much  money,"  were  now,  says  Lee,  held, 
rent  free,  by  the  principal  of  the  school.  The  gentlemen  of 
Brunswick,  of  whose  ungracious  conduct  the  Bishop  had 
complained  a  few  years  before,  at  last  appear  to  have  carried 
their  point — wrested  the  scliool  "out  of  our  hands."  But 
if,  as  the  heroic  Lee  observes,  a  good  school  was  maintained, 
the  labors  of  Asbury  and  his  helpers  in  the  good  work  were 
not  in  vain,  nor  lost  to  the  world  or  the  Church.  The  Eev. 
"W.  W.  Lear,  before  named,  informs  me  that  Ebenezer  has 
not  been  used  for  school  purposes  for  thirty  or  forty  years. 
The  whole  property,  buildings  and  farm,  was  sold  by  author- 
ity of  an  act  of  the  State  Legislature.  What  became  of  the 
money  my  informant  does  not  state.  The  present  owner  is 
L.  J.  Wall,  of  Sturgeon ville.  When  the  Ebenezer  Academy 
closed  there  was  built  a  substitute  for  it,  called  "  Red  Oak 
Academy,"  a  few  miles  to  the  left.     This  school  also  died 


Ebenezer  Academy.  43 

years  ago,  and  tlie  building  was  lately  burned  to  the  ground. 
The  Bishop's  "  troublesome  stone  "  still  stands.  Brunswick 
now  has  but  one  academy.  The  principal  of  this,  in  1848, 
was  one  of  the  writer's  pupils  a  few  years  earlier  at  the 
Gouverneur  Wesleyan  Seminary,  St.  Lawrence  County,  New 
York.  This  was  Rev.  (afterward  Dr.)  James  A.  Dean,  lately 
deceased  in  New  Orleans. 


44  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTER  lY. 

BETHEL  ACADEMY,  KENTUCKY. 

Prior  to  December,  1776,  there  was  a  vast,  almost  un- 
known territory  called  Transylvania,  lying  to  the  west  of 
Virginia.  In  this  year  the  Legislature  of  Virginia  organ- 
ized it  as  a  county  under  the  name  of  Kentucky.  By  a  sub- 
sequent act  the  county  became  three  counties ;  namely,  Jef- 
ferson, Fayette,  and  Lincoln.  In  1792  these  became  a  State. 
This  territory  was  explored  by  Daniel  Boone,  a  youth  of  six- 
teen summers,  in  1769,  and  permanently  settled  by  him  and 
others  in  1775.  Two  renowned  Methodist  local  preachers, 
Francis  Clark  and  William  J.  Thompson,  were  among  the 
first  settlers.  James  Haw  and  Benjamin  Ogden,  regular 
Methodist  ministers,  followed  in  1786.  Circuits  were  organ- 
ized, and  Methodism  became  fully  established. 

By  tlie  Legislature  of  Virginia  eight  thousand  acres  of  land 
were,  in  1780,  set  apart  in  the  county  of  Kentucky  for  the 
establishment  of  schools.  The  few  Kentucky  Methodists  took 
early  measures  to  secure  a  part  of  the  land,  so  generously 
appropriated  to  education,  for  the  establishment  of  a  semi- 
nary of  learning.  They  appealed  to  the  Bishops  for  aid  and 
counsel.  Bishops  Coke  and  Asbury  both  attended  a  Confer- 
ence held  at  M'Knight's,  on  the  Yadkin  Kiver,  in  North 
Carolina,  in  1789. 

Here  the  Kentucky  brethren  appeared,  by  letters  and  mes- 
sengers, asking  aid  in  more  fully  organizing  Methodism  and 
in  establishing  a  college.  The  subject  was  taken  up,  debated, 
and  the  answer  returned  to  the  noble  Kentucky  Methodists 


Bethel  Academy.  45 

was  that,  during  the  next  year,  Bisliop  Asbnrj  would  visit 
them,  and  that  if  they  could  secure  a  grant  of  live  thousand 
acres  of  land  from  the  State  or  from  individuals,  tliat  a  college 
should  be  completed  in  the  State  within  ten  years.  Early 
the  next  spring  Bishop  Asbury,  accompanied  by  his  friend 
Richard  Whatcoat,  who  a  few  years  later  was  elected  and  or- 
dained a  Bishop,  commenced  preparations  for  the  perilous  trip 
on  horseback  to  Kentucky.  They  spent  two  weeks  in  south- 
western Virginia,  preaching  and  praying  among  the  people, 
waiting  for  the  brethren  from  Kentucky,  who  were  to  return 
immediately  as  an  escort  and  guard  to  the  good  Bishop  and 
his  friend.  On  a  certain  Monday  morning  Bishop  Asbury 
related  to  Mr.  Whatcoat  that  the  night  before,  in  a  dream,  he 
had  seen  the  friends  for  whom  they  had  been  waiting.  After 
breakfast  the  Bishop  retired  to  a  small  stream  near  by  for 
meditation  and  prayer.  While  there  he  saw  two  men  coming 
over  the  hills  toward  him.  He  felt  assured  at  once  that 
these  were  Kentuckians  who  were  coming  for  him.  And  so 
it  proved.  The  men  were  Peter  Massie,  in  future  years 
known  as  the  weeping  prophet,  and  John  Clark.  They 
delivered  to  the  Bishop  letters,  and  informed  him  that  they 
had  left  eight  other  men  in  the  valley  below,  all  ready  to 
start  with  him  for  Kentucky  as  soon  as  he  was  ready.  The 
Bishop  entered  in  his  Journal :  "  After  reading  the  letters, 
and  asking  counsel  of  God,  I  concluded  to  go  with  them." 
They  left  the  valley  of  the  Cumberland  early  in  May,  1790, 
with  sixteen  men,  including  the  Bishop,  carrying  thirteen 
guns.  An  unbroken  forest  of  more  than  two  hundred 
miles,  inhabited  by  ferocious  beasts  and  more  ferocious  sav- 
ages, lay  between  them  and  the  end  of  their  journey.  They 
halted  three  times  a  day  to  feed  and  refresh  their  horses,  and 
as  often  for  prayer  to  God.     The  first  day  they  made  thirty- 


46  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

five  miles,  the  second  forty-five,  the  third  fifty,  and  at  about 
these  rates  for  seven  days,  going  into  camp  late  at  night. 

The  Bishop  wrote  in  his  Journal :  "  I  am  strangely  outdone 
for  want  of  sleep.  The  first  night  I  slept  about  one  hour, 
the  last  about  two.  We  ate  no  regular  meal ;  our  bread 
grew  short,  and  I  was  much  spent."  While  in  camp  some 
were  on  guard,  while  the  others  rested.  They  frequently 
passed  the  graves  of  those  slain  by  savages ;  in  one  camp 
twenty-four  graves.  They  arrived  at  Lexington  on  the  12th 
of  May.  Asbury  preached  on  the  day  of  their  arrival.  The 
court  was  in  session,  and  the  court-house  being  thus  occu- 
pied, they  held  the  Conference  "  in  the  comfortable  house  of 
Eichard  Masterson,"  opening  on  the  14:th  of  May,  1790.  In 
regard  to  the  work  of  the  Conference  the  Bishop  makes  this 
record : 

"We  went  through  our  business  in  great  love  and  har- 
mony. I  ordained  Wilson  Lee,  Thomas  Williamson,  and 
Barnabas  M'Henry,  elders.  We  had  preaching  noon  and 
night,  and  souls  were  converted.  My  soul  has  been  blessed 
among  this  people,  and  I  am  exceedingly  pleased  with  them. 
I  would  not,  for  the  worth  of  the  place,  have  been  prevented 
in  this  visit.  It  is  true,  such  exertions  of  mind  and  body 
are  trying ;  but  I  am  supported  under  them  ;  if  souls  are  saved, 
it  is  enough.  Brother  Poythress  is  much  alive  to  God.  We 
fixed  upon  a  plan  for  a  school,  and  called  it  Bethel ;  and 
obtained,  in  land  and  money,  a  subscription  of  upward  of 
three  hundred  pounds  toward  its  establishment.  We  rode 
to  I.  Lewis's,  on  the  bend  of  the  Kentucky  Kiver.  Lewis  is 
an  old  acquaintance  from  Leesburg,  Virginia.  I  was  pleased 
to  find  that  heaven  and  religion  were  not  lost  sight  of  in  this 
family.  Brother  Lewis  offered  me  one  hundred  acres  of  land 
for  Bethel  on  a  good  spot  for  building  material." 


Bethel  Academy.  47 

This  site,  tendered  by  Mr.  Lewis,  was  accepted  by  those 
having  control.  It  was  in  what,  in  1798,  became  Jessa- 
mine County,  in  the  center  of  the  State,  and  not  very 
remote  from  Lexington,  its  capital.  In  that  county  great 
numbers  of  the  first  Methodists,  including  some  local  and 
some  traveling  preachei*s,  settled.  All  these  circumstances 
were  in  favor  of  making  that  the  location  of  Bethel  Acad- 
emy. The  Bishop  remained  in  that  vicinity  nearly  two 
weeks,  during  which  he  preached  thirteen  sermons,  made 
many  acquaintances,  and  also  many  friends  for  the  projected 
school. 

Having  accomplished  all  that  could  then  be  done,  the  good 
Bishop  prepared  to  set  out  on  his  return  journey  through  the 
wilderness.  His  principal  assistants  in  establishing  the  Bethel 
school  were  Rev.  Francis  Poythress,  the  first  presiding  elder 
of  the  Kentucky  District,  and  the  Rev.  John  Metcalf.  As 
Poythress  fell  a  martyr  to  this  undertaking,  a  brief  sketch  of 
his  career  will  be  appreciated.  He  belonged  to  an  old, 
wealthy  Virginia  family.  Aroused  to  a  sense  of  his  lost 
estate  as  a  sinner,  he  sought  the  instructions  of  a  pious  min- 
ister of  the  Church  of  England,  a  life-long  friend  of  Bishop 
Asbury.  Mr.  Jarratt  led  him  to  the  Saviour  in  the  year 
1773.  He  was  soon  after  enrolled  in  the  ranks  of  the  Meth- 
odist itinerants.  In  North  Carolina,  Maryland,  Tennessee, 
Virginia,  and  Kentucky,  he  was  in  the  thickest  of  the  fight, 
a  leader  in  the  advancing  hosts.  When  a  call  was  made 
for  a  man  for  hard,  dangerous,  responsible,  self-denying 
work,  from  the  noble  Poythress  came  the  voice,  "  Here  am 
I ;  send  me." 

For  many  years  he  traveled  large  districts  as  presiding 
elder,  sleeping  under  trees,  in  open  cabins,  sharing  the  hard- 
ships of  the  settlers  in  their  wilderness  homes.     Himself  a 


48  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

good  scholar,  he  was  easily  enlisted  in  the  woj-k  of  building 
Bethel  Academy ;  that  enterprise  not  proving  an  entire  suc- 
cess, and  he  being  cruelly  censured,  his  health  failed,  his  mind 
gave  way — he  was  insane.  He  had  previously  filled  every 
office  in  the  Methodist  ministry  except  that  of  the  Episco- 
pacy. For  this  he  was  nominated  by  Bislio23  Asbury,  and 
would  have  been  elected  but  for  the  fact  that  at  an  Annual 
Conference  a  Bishop  could  not  be  made  for  the  whole  Church. 

To  remove  him  as  far  as  possible  from  the  scenes  of  his 
not-wholly-successful  labors  in  behalf  of  Bethel  Academy, 
Mr.  Poythress  was,  in  the  year  1800,  removed  from  the  Lex- 
ington District,  Kentucky,  and  made  presiding  elder  in  east- 
ern North  Carolina,  his  field  of  earlier  successes  as  a  pioneer 
itinerant.  Here  he  performed  his  last  labors.  His  spirit 
was  broken.  At  the  end  of  one  year  he  returned  to  Ken- 
tucky. His  name  for  1801  and  1802  appears  in  the  list  of 
elders,  but  no  work  was  assigned  him.  His  home  was  at 
Nicholasville,  which,  in  1798,  was  made  the  county-seat  of 
Jessamine  County.  It  was  made  a  village,  and  its  streets 
surveyed  by  Kev.  John  Metcalf  in  1798,  and,  in  honor  of  his 
friend  the  Hon.  George  Nichols,  a  somewhat  noted  lawyer, 
was,  by  Mr.  Metcalf,  called  Nicholas ville. 

In  1810,  on  the  15  th  of  October,  Bishop  Asbury  looked 
upon  the  face  of  his  former  old  and  very  dear  friend,  the 
good,  but  most  unfortunate,  Poythress  for  the  last  time.  He 
wrote  at  that  date  in  his  Journal :  "  This  has  been  an  awful 
day  to  me.  I  visited  Francis  Poythress.  '  If  thou  be  he — 
but  O  !  how  fallen ! '  "  Dr.  Abel  Stevens  says  :  "A  reviving 
light  breaks  over  him  in  his  last  days." 

Of  the  Bishop's  other  principal  aid  in  the  work  of  building 
Bethel  Academy  a  few  words  are  due.  Rev.  John  Metcalf, 
one  of  the  pioneer  preachers  in  Kentucky,  before  it  became 


Bethel  Academy.  49 

a  State,  was  a  native  of  Soutliampton  County,  Yirf^inia.  He 
settled  in  what  subsequently  became  Jessamine  County  in 
the  early  spring  of  1790. 

Samuel  M.  Duncan,  Esq.,  a  worthy  old  resident  of  Nicli- 
olasville,  and  more  familiar,  perhaps,  with  the  early  history 
of  Jessamine  County  and  of  Bethel  Academy  than  any  man 
now  living,  in  a  letter  dated  May,  1885,  says  of  Mr.  Metcalf : 
"  To  advance  the  cause  of  Christ  and  be  instrumental  in  the 
salvation  of  men  wore  objects  which  he  not  only  had  in  view^ 
but  which  he  biirned  with  furnace  ardor  to  accomplish. 
Every-where  and  at  all  times  he  was  not  only  ready  but  eager 
to  engage  in  any  enterprise  which  promised  the  accomplish- 
ment of  these  purposes.  His  zeal  was  untiring.  No  success 
could  satiate  its  eager  longings,  nor  any  discouragements 
quench  its  ardor." 

But  to  return  from  this  digression.  In  1792,  on  his  second 
visit  to  Kentucky,  Asbury  entered  in  his  Journal:  "I  wrote 
an  address  on  behalf  of  Bethel  School."  At  a  later  date, 
during  the  same  visit,  lie  wrote  again  :  "I  found  it  necessary 
to  change  the  plan  of  the  house  to  make  it  more  comfortable 
for  the  scholars  in  winter." 

In  the  old  "Methodist  Magazine"  of  1816-1828,  Eev. 
Thomas  llinde,  M.D.,  a  contemporary  of  both  Asbury  and 
Poythress,  and  long  a  member  of  the  old  Kentucky  Confer- 
ence, under  tlie  nom  de  plume  of  Theopliilus  Arminius, 
gave  a  series  of  interesting  articles  "  Upon  tlie  Progress  of 
Methodism  in  the  Western  Country."  In  one  of  these  arti- 
cles appears  this  notice  of 

BETHEL   ACADEMY : 

"  Our  Conference  for  1797  was  held  at  Bethel  School,  a 

large,  three-story  brick  building  erected  by  Mr.  Poythress  on 
3 


50  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

the  bank  of  the  Kentucky  River  in  Jessamine  Conntj.  Mr. 
Poythress  had  used  great  exertions  to  accomplish  the  under- 
taking ;  but  being  old  and  infirm,  and  censured  by  some  for 
the  ineligibility  of  the  situation  and  the  expense  of  the  build- 
ing, being  a  man  of  integrity  and  of  very  nice  feelings,  tlie 
most  serious  consequences  resulted." 

This  is  a  noble  testimony  from  a  competent  and  reliable 
witness,  and  fully  exonerates  poor  Poythress  from  what  could 
not  have  been  designed  as  an  implication  of  wrong,  in  the 
sad  words  of  Bishop  Asbury,  but  has  been  so  construed  by 
some.  How  changed !  instead  of  how  fallen !  would  have 
been  less  equivocal. 

The  work  of  completing  the  building  had  made  such  prog- 
ress that  early  in  the  year  1794  a  school  was  opened.  The 
following  old  letter,  copied  from  the  original  now  in  posses- 
sion of  Samuel  M.  Duncan,  of  Nicholasville,  Kentucky, 
to  which  Bethel  was  removed  from  its  original  site  in 
1805,  fully  settles  this  fact : 

"Jessamine  County,  Ky.,  Jan.  13,  1794. 
"  Honorable  George  Nichols  :  I  have  lately  received 
from  you  two  of  your  kind  letters,  and  would  have  answered 
them  before  now,  but  I  have  taken  charge  of  Bethel  Acad- 
emy, and  have  been  so  confined  for  the  last  two  weeks  in  fit- 
ting up  suitable  places  of  abode  for  some  of  my  pupils,  that 
I  have  greatly  neglected  my  private  affairs,  and  especially 
that  portion  of  it  whicli  you  are  attending  to  in  Lexington. 
"  Your  friend,  John  Metcalf." 

The  author  of  this  letter  is  supposed  to  have  become  an 
itinerant  on  trial  in  1790,  though  his  name  does  not  appear 
in  the  list  given  in  answer  to  "  Question  1.  Who  are  admit- 
ted on  trial  ? "  but,  in  1791,  his  name  is  found  in  the  list  of 


Bethel  Academy.  51 

those  "  who  remain  on  trial,"  and  for  this  year  he  was  ap- 
pointed to  Banks  Circuit,  in  Virginia.  The  next  year  he 
was  "admitted  into  full  connection"  and  sent  to  Botetourt 
Circuit  as  a  deacon.  From  the  Conference  of  1793  he  was 
appointed  to  Lexington  Circuit.  This  included  the  seat  of 
Bethel  Academy.  At  tlie  request  of  Bishop  Asbury,  early 
in  January,  1794,  as  the  old  letter  before  inserted  proves,  Mr. 
Metcalf  took  charge  of  Bethel  Academy.  His  name  now 
disappears  from  the  minutes  of  the  Conference.  Dr.  Bangs 
gives  it  among  those  who  located  in  1795.  Rev.  Henry 
Smith,  one  of  the  veterans  of  the  Baltimore  Conference, 
attended  the  session  of  the  Kentucky  Conference  for  1797. 
It  met  in  Bethel  Academy,  and  he  mentions  Rev.  John  Met- 
calf  as  the  principal,  at  that  time,  of  Bethel  Academy.  Mr. 
Duncan,  before  named,  says  that  he  continued  principal  until 
1803.  Mr.  Metcalf  was  not  a  classical  scholar,  but  spoke  and 
wrote  the  English  language  with  correctness  and  great  vigor 
and  the  Methodist  school,  located  on  the  high  bluff,  at  a  bend 
in  the  Kentucky  River,  under  the  vigorous  administration  of 
John  Metcalf,  was  a  strong  competitor  of  Transylvania  Acad- 
emy, at  Lexington,  in  Fayette  County.  Transylvania  was 
then  under  the  control  of  the  Presbyterian  Church,  and  had 
the  advantage  of  a  small  village  around  it.  It  was  opened 
in  1780,  while  Kentucky  was  yet  but  a  county  of  Virginia. 
The  site  of  Bethel  was  chosen  for  its  intrinsic  beauty,  and  as 
an  eligible  site  for  a  village,  which  it  was  hoped  would  grow 
up  around  it  and  become  the  county-seat  of  the  new 
county,  which  was  organized  eight  years  later,  under  the 
name  of  Jessamine,  of  which  Nicholasville  became  the  seat 
of  justice. 

Mr.  Duncan  says :  "  As  the  principal  of  this  school  in  the 
wilderness  Mr.  Metcalf  infused  his  spirit  into  every  depart- 


52  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

merit.  If  there  was  the  least  jar,  he  had  the  eye  to  detect, 
and  the  skill  to  remove." 

Mr.  Duncan  continues:  "In  1Y99  Rev.  Yalentine  Cook 
took  charge  for  one  year  of  the  academic  department,  with 
Rev.  Francis  Poythress  as  his  assistant."  These  statements 
of  Mr.  Duncan  are  confirmed  by  the  general  minutes. 
Cook's  name  is  not  found  in  the  list  of  appointments  for 
1789.  There  was  then  no  rule  of  the  Church  under  which  a 
preacher  could  be  appointed  to  a  school.  Mr.  Poythress,  as 
presiding  elder  on  the  territory  of  the  school,  could  have 
served  as  an  assistant  to  Mr.  Cook,  who,  as  all  agree,  opened 
at  that  time  the  academic  department  of  the  academy.  The 
Kentucky  historian  of  Methodism,  Rev.  Dr.  Redfield,  speaks 
of  Valentine  Cook  as  the  organizer  of  the  academy.  He  is 
correct,  if  he  only  intended  the  academic  department  of  the 
academy,  which,  as  a  preparatory  school,  was  opened  by  Mr. 
Metcalf  in  1794.  Mr.  Cook  was  a  fine  scholar,  the  most  dis- 
tinguished of  the  graduates  of  Cokesbury  College,  at  Abing- 
don, Maryland.  He  remained  but  a  year  in  the  school,  but 
afterward  taught  in  other  places.  After  Mr.  Metcalf  re- 
moved to  Nicholasville,  in  1803,  and  opened,'  in  his  own 
house,  a  school,  which  he  called  Bethel  Academy,  Mr. 
Harris  continued  Bethel  School,  on  the  Kentucky  River,  as 
a  neighborhood  school  until  1805. 

In  1798  Mr.  Metcalf  purchased  several  lots  in  the  then 
new  village  of  Mcholasville,  and  erected  a  good  log-house, 
which  still  stands,  and  is  the  property  of  a  grandson,  John 
Metcalf.  At  tliis  house  Mr.  Metcalf  continued  Bethel  Acad- 
emy until,  in  1820,  a  good  brick  building  was  completed,  and 
the  school  was  continued  in  it,  still  under  the  name  of  Bethel 
Academy.  Mr.  Metcalf  died  at  about  this  date,  in  the  sixty- 
third  year  of  his  age.     In  1820  a  Mr.  O'Brien,  a  fair  scholar. 


Bethel  Academy.  63 

says  Mr.  Duncan,  took  charge  of  Bethel  Academy,  and  did 
much  toward  keeping  ahve  the  influence  and  teachings  of 
the  Methodist  Church.  The  institution  ceased  to  be  strictly 
denominational  from  the  date  of  its  removal  to  Nicholas- 
ville,  though  often,  and  perhaps  generally,  under  the  super- 
intendence of  a  Methodist  teacher.  For  five  years  from 
1841  Prof.  A.  R.  Northrup,  A.M.,  a  graduate  of  the  Wes- 
leyan  University,  was  at  its  head.  He  was  succeeded  by 
Charles  F.  Smith.  Mr.  Duncan  sends  a  copy  of  two  letters 
from  Rev.  John  Metcalf,  dating  back  into  the  former  cent- 
ury, showing  that,  through  its  officers  and  teachers.  Bethel 
Academy  liad  an  important  agency  in  settling  upon  a  good 
basis  of  prosperity  the  educational  and  other  interests  of  the 
county  in  which  it  was  located.  He  also  gives  a  list  of  a 
score  of  men,  who,  as  ministers  of  the  Gospel,  physicians, 
lawyers,  judges,  members  of  the  State  and  National  legisla- 
tures, and  in  other  positions,  who  laid  the  foundation  for 
the  distinction  to  which  they  all  attained  while  students  in 
old  Bethel  Academy. 

Rev.  Dr.  Thomas  Hinde,  the  maternal  uncle  of  the  late 
Bishop  Kavanaugii,  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church, 
South,  in  a  conversation  with  a  trustee  of  M'Kendree  Col- 
lege, sometime  in  the  summer  of  1845,  upon  the  great 
good  work  accomplished  by  tlie  schools  of  Bishop  Asbury, 
mentioned  the  names  of  more  than  half  a  dozen  of  the 
then  leading  politicians  of  the  West  and  South  who  were 
educated  at  Bethel  Academy,  Ky.,  before  the  present  cent- 
ury. Among  them,  I  think,  he  named  Henry  Clay.  Bethel 
was  incorporated,  with  full  academic  powers,  in  1802,  and 
some  years  before  received  a  grant  of  six  thousand  acres  of 
land  from  the  State.  But  at  the  time  there  was  so  much 
government  land  in  the  market  that  the  school  never  made 


64  Ea.rly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

this  generous  gift  available.  It  reverted  to  the  State.  Mr. 
Duncan  also  furnishes  me  a  letter  from  Prof.  A.  N.  Gordon, 
showing  that  the  works  of  Bishop  Asburj,  Francis  Poythress, 
John  Metcalf,  Nathaniel  Harris,  Valentine  Cook,  and  others, 
who  labored  for  Bethel,  "  do  follow  them." 

Under  date  of  Bethel  Academy,  Maj  11,  1885,  Prof. 
Gordon  says :  "  In  1876  I  was  elected  principal  of  Bethel 
Academy  for  one  year,  with  the  understanding  that,  at  the 
end  of  the  year,  I  was  to  have  the  lease  for  a  term  of  years, 
if  such  an  arrangement  seemed  desirable  by  myself  and  the 
trustees.  In  pursuance  of  that  arrangement,  the  property 
was  leased  to  me,  in  the  summer  of  1877,  for  ten  years,  I 
introducing  the  condition  that  '^ve  indigent  sprightly 
boys '  should  attend  the  academy  each  year  free  of  tuition. 
Since  that  year  I  have  always  had  an  assistant,  with  an 
average  of  forty  pupils.  My  aim  is  to  prepare  boys  for  at 
least  the  junior  class  in  our  best  colleges.  Pupils  have  fre- 
quently gone  further,  finishing  the  Calculus,  and  reading  the 
most  advanced  authors  in  Latin  and  Greek.  The  school  is  now 
undenominational.  The  grounds  lie  well,  containing  about 
^ve  acres,  and  the  buildings  are  new,  large,  and  elegant,  hav- 
ing been  put  up  in  1878  at  a  cost  of  about  $7,000.  The 
school  is  in  a  far  more  prosperous  condition  now  than  for 
many  years,  and  has  a  fair  prospect  before  it.  I  am  a  grad- 
uate of  Washington  and  Lee  University,  Virginia,  and  follow 
teaching  as  a  profession." 

If  the  departed  still  continue  their  acquaintance  with 
events  transpiring  in  their  old  abodes,  why  should  not  the 
fact  that  his  favorite  Bethel  Academy  still  lives  and  is  doing 
the  work  for  which  he  so  gladly  labored  and  suffered  in  its 
establishment,  add  something  to  the  "fullness  of  joy"  that 
the  sainted  Asbury  enjoys  in  the  mansions  above  ? 


Bethel  Academy.  65 


THE    FINALE    OF    BETHEL    SCHOOL. 

In  1870  I  addressed  a  letter  of  irKpiiry  to  my  venerable 
friend,  Bishop  Kavanaugh,  in  regard  to  Bethel  Academ^^ 
His  kind  answer  added  but  little  to  ray  information,  but  is 
valuable  as  confirmatory  of  what  I  supposed  reliable  facts. 
Next  to  reports  published  at  the  time  of  the  occurrences,  the 
recollections  of  those  who  lived  near  the  time  and  place  are 
our  best  authorities.  The  Bishop's  letter  from  Louisville, 
Ky.,  dated  August,  1879,  gives  these  items :  "  The  first 
Kentucky  Conference  was  held  by  Bisliop  Asbury.  A  plan 
was  there  made  for  a  Conference  school,  to  be  called  Bethel. 
It  was  principally  built  through  the  exertions  of  Rev.  Fran- 
cis Poythress,  the  first  presiding  elder  of  Lexington  District. 
It  was  located  in  Jessamine  County,  and  stood  on  a  high 
bluff  on  the  Kentucky  River.  The  project  originated  with 
Mr.  Asbury,  Francis  Poythress,  Isaac  Ilite,  and  others.  A 
spacious  building  was  erected,  I  think  eighty  by  forty  feet, 
three  stories  high.  The  design  was  to  accommodate  board- 
ers in  the  house.  Among  the  men  who  were  teachers  in 
the  school  were  Francis  Poythress,  Rev.  John  Metcalf,  and 
Nathaniel  Harris.  The  school  had  its  best  Heading  in  Val- 
entine Cook,  the  most  literary  man  we  had  in  the  West  for 
some  considerable  time.  lie  organized  the  academic  depart- 
ment, and  at  first  the  prospects  were  flattering,  but  soon  dif- 
ficulties arose,  prospects  diminished,  and  Cook  gave  up  tho 
enterprise.  A  scliool  for  the  neighborhood  was  conducted 
in  the  building  for  some  time  by  various  teachere ;  afterward 
it  was  abandoned.  The  one  hundred  acres  of  land,  given  by 
Mr.  Lewis,  reverted  to  his  estate,  and  portions  of  tho  mate- 
rial in  the  building  were  taken  to  Nicholas  villa,  and  used  in 
erecting  an  academy  for  the  use  of   the   place.     Sometimes 


66  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

it  is  occupied  by  our  Churcli,  sometimes  by  others.  I  think 
it  is  held  by  trustees  for  the  benefit  of  the  town  in  which  it 
stands." 

This  is  the  testimony  of  an  old  Kentucky  itinerant,  famil- 
iar with  every  part  of  the  State. 

Bishop  Kavanaugh  adds  one  other  item  of  some  interest : 
"  My  uncle,  the  Kev.  Thomas  Hinde — '  Theophilus  Armin- 
ius ' — I  think  is  mistaken  about  Mr.  Clay  having  ever  gone 
to  school  at  Bethel  Academy.  Mr.  Clay  came  in  early 
years  from  Virginia  to  Kentucky;  he  had  been  trained 
in  a  clerk's  office,  and  I  am  sr.re  never  attended  school  in 
Kentucky." 

Bishop  Kavanaugh's  recollections  are  confirmed  by  Mr. 
Clay's  history.  Clay  was  the  son  of  a  Baptist  preacher,  who 
died  in  1782.  His  mother  remarried,  and  in  1792  removed 
to  Kentucky.  To  improve  his  education  Henry  remained  at 
Kichmond,  Ya.  He  spent  four  years  in  the  office  of  Peter 
Lindsley,  clerk  of  the  High  Court  of  Chancery ;  he  studied 
law,  was  admitted  to  the  bar,  and  in  1797  settled  in  Lexing- 
ton, Kentucky. 

Bishop  Asbury  met  the  Kentucky  Conference  again  in 
Bethel  Academy  in  the  year  1800.  On  Saturday,  October 
4th,  he  made  one  of  the  longest  entries  to  be  found  in  his 
Journal,  namely :  ''  I  came  to  Bethel.  Bishop  Whatcoat  and 
William  M'Kendree  preached.  I  was  so  dejected  I  could 
do  little  but  weep.  Sabbath  it  rained,  and  I  kept  at 
home.  Here  is  Bethel — Cokesbury  in  miniature — eighty 
by  forty  feet,  three  stories,  with  a  high  roof,  and  finished 
below.  Now  we  want  a  fund,  and  an  income  of  three  hun- 
dred per  year  to  carry  it  on,  without  which  it  will  be  useless. 
But  it  is  too  distant  from  public  places  ;  its  being  surrounded 
by  the  Kentucky  Kiver  in  part  we  now  find  to  be  no  benefit ; 


Bethel  Academy.  67 

thus  all  our  excellences  are  turned  into  defects.  Perhaps 
Brother  Poythress  and  myself  were  as  much  overseen  with 
tliis  place  as  Dr.  Coke  was  with  the  seat  of  Cokesbury. 
But  all  is  well  that  ends  well,  and  all  is  wrong  that  works 
wrong;  and  we  must  be  blamed  by  men  of  slender  sense 
for  consequences  impossible  to  foresee — for  other  peoples' 
misconduct. 

"  Sabbath  day,  Monday,  and  Tuesday,  we  were  shut  up  in 
Bethel  with  the  traveling  and  local  preachers,  and  the  trust- 
ees that  could  be  called  together.  It  was  thought  best  to 
carry  the  first  design  of  education  into  execution,  and  that 
we  should  employ  a  man  of  sterling  qualifications  to  be 
chosen  by  and  under  the  direction  of  a  select  number  of 
trustees  and  others,  who  should  obligate  themselves  to  see  him 
paid.     Dr.  Jennings  was  thought  of,  talked  of,  written  to." 

This  Dr.  Jennings  will  appear  again. 

The  Bishop  continued  his  visits  to  Kentucky  nearly  every 
year  up  to  the  last  year  of  his  life.  On  these  visits  he  sev- 
eral times  passed  through  Jessamine  County.  Once  he 
called  on  the  widow  of  his  dear  friend,  in  whose  "  comfort- 
able house"  he  held  the  first  Kentucky  Conference.  He 
was  once  at  least  in  Nicholasville,  the  seat  of  the  academy 
erected  in  part  of  material  that  entered  into  the  structure  of 
Bethel  Academy.  But  in  his  Journal  no  subsequent  record 
of  Bethel  Academy  is  found.  The  last  entry  he  made  was 
the  sad  requiem  over  crushed  hopes.  He  had  wept  over  the 
mental  shipwreck  of  his  very  dear  friend,  the  companion  of 
so  many  cares,  of  so  much  toil  for  God  and  his  cause ;  the 
sharer  of  so  many  labors  to  make  Bethel  a  success,  and  now 
the  sharer  with  him  in  the  unwise  and  unjust  censures  that  it 
liad  not  accomplished  all  that  had  been  hoped;  and  having, 

as  the  entry  shows,  made  with  the  trustees  and  preachers  tlie 
3* 


58  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

last  effort  to  achieve  success,  he  dismissed  the  subject,  lays 
off  that  burden  to  assume  others,  and  to  prosecute  his  mis- 
sion to  its  close.  Who,  in  the  retrospect,  with  all  the  facts 
before  him,  will  venture  to  write  Bethel  School  in  Ken- 
tucky a  failure  ?  It  was  one  of  a  number  of  experiments, 
made  at  great  disadvantage  in  an  almost  wilderness  country, 
leading  to  the  final  grand  success  of  Methodist  education  in 
America. 


Union  School  and  Madison  College. 


CHAPTER  y. 

UNION  SCHOOL   AND  MADISON  COLLEGE,  UNIONTOWN,   PA. 

Uniontown,  the  county-seat  of  Fayette  County,  Pa.,  early 
became  an  important  center  of  Methodism  in  the  days  of 
Asbury.  On  his  Western  preaching  and  supervising  tours, 
Uniontown  lay  in  his  route.  The  Bishop's  Journal  mentions 
at  least  nine  visits  to  this  inland  town.  Six  of  these  visits 
were  to  preside  in  Annual  Conferences.  The  other  three 
visits  were  to  be  present  and  aid  in  tlie  services  of  great 
camp-meetings  held  in  the  vicinity.  Bishop  Asbury  was 
the  pastor  of  the  people  in  a  more  practical  sense  than  have 
been  any  of  his  successors.  He  lived  at  their  houses,  often 
met  them  in  the  class-meeting,  love-feast,  at  their  camp-meet- 
ings, and  at  school  examinations.  Traveling  on  horseback, 
noon  and  night  found  him  in  the  home  of  some  private 
family,  provided  he  had  time  for  the  usual  meal  at  noon. 

Eeturning  from  his  second  visit  to  the  Kentucky  Confer- 
ence, in  1792,  accompanied  by  his  special  friend  Hope  Hull, 
so  distinguished  in  future  years  for  his  labors  as  teacher  and 
preacher  in  Georgia.  They  had  climbed  the  Cumberland 
Mountains  from  Kentucky,  descended  into  the  valley  of  the 
Holston,  in  East  Tennessee,  where  the  Bishop  had  held  a  ses- 
sion of  the  Holston  Conference,  thence  through  south-west- 
ern and  western  Virginia,  they  arrived  on  the  31st  of  May  at 
Uniontown.  The  journey  had  been  one  of  unusual  hardships, 
enhanced  by  the  general  discomforts  of  travel  with  a  large 
company,  and  occupying  with  other  wayfarers  the  small, 
crowded,   necessarily  soiled  cabins   and    beds,    of  the    kind 


60  ExVRLY  Schools  of  Methodism. 

sojourners,  wlio  often,  without  money  or  price,  gave  the  trav- 
elers the  best  that  their  new  homes  afforded.  It  was  not  the 
fault  of  the  inhabitants  that  the  accommodations  for  travel- 
ers were  so  inferior.  Their  hospitality  was  greatly  overtaxed. 
For  fear  of  attack  from  hostile  tribes,  who  looked  with  alarm 
upon  the  swelling  tides  of  settlers  tilling  up  the  West,  trav- 
elers usually  moved  in  large  companies.  At  night,  compa- 
nies of  forty  or  lifty,  more  or  less,  sought  shelter  in  a  small 
liouse  of  one,  two,  or  three  rooms.  This  occurring  almost 
nightly  on  these  great  lines  of  travel,  accommodations  were 
necessarily  poor.  The  Bishop  incidentally  mentions  that 
his  company  on  this  hard  trip  was  a  large  one.     He  says : 

"We  had  the  best  company  I  ever  met  with.  Thirty-six 
good  travelers,  and  a  few  warriors;  but  we  had  one  pack- 
horse  [his  own],  some  old  men  [himself  included],  and  two 
tired  horses.  These  were  not  the  best  part."  But  the  three 
hundred  miles  between  the  Holston  Conference,  in  East  Ten- 
nessee, and  the  Baltimore  Conference,  at  Uniontown,  are  now 
behind  them. 

This  is  the  Bishop's  entry  in  his  Journal :  "  Both  men  and 
horses,  travel-sore  and  weary,  reach  Uniontown.  O  how  good 
are  clean  houses,  plentiful  tables,  and  populous  villages,  when 
compared  wdth  the  rough  world  we  came  through !  Here  I 
turned  out  our  poor  horses  to  pasture  and  rest,  after  riding 
them  nearly  three  hundred  miles  in  eight  days." 

He  describes  his  employments,  health,  the  business  of  the 
Conference,  the  wants  of  the  Church,  and  other  matters  of 
interest,  and  then  adds :  "  We  have  here  founded  a  seminary 
of  learning,  called 

''  UNION   SCHOOL. 

Brother  Charles  Conaway  is  the  manager,  who  also  has  charge 
of  the  district.     This  establishment  is  designed  for  instrue- 


Union  School  and  Madison  College.  61 

tion  in  grammar,  the  languages,  and  the  sciences."  Four 
years  hiter  the  Bishop  made  his  last  visit  to  Uuiontowu ; 
change  of  routes  of  travel  carried  him  around  this  place  after- 
ward. He  made  no  other  mention  in  his  Journal  of  Union 
Seminary. 

Isaac  P.  Cook,  D.D.,  long  a  prominent  local  preacher  of 
Baltimore,  Md.,  and  once  president  of  the  Local  Preachers' 
National  Association,  in  a  letter  to  the  writer,  says :  "  When 
a  part  of  the  present  Pittsburg  Conference  was  included  in 
the  Baltimore  Conference,  a  seminary  of  high  grade  was 
organized  at  Uniontown,  Pa.  Rev.  Charles  Conaway,  pre- 
siding elder  of  the  district,  was  its  president,  or,  as  Bishop 
Asbury  expressed  it,  its  manager.  I  think  that  after  Mr. 
Conaway  was  removed  to  other  work,  under  the  rule  limiting 
the  stay  of  a  preacher  on  a  charge,  that  Valentine  Cook,  a 
distinguished  graduate  of  the  first  Cokesbury,  succeeded  Mr. 
Conaway  in  the  management  of  the  school." 

The  school-room  was  an  addition  to  the  Methodist  church, 
built  in  1786.  This  gave  the  seminary  the  use  of  the  church 
for  a  chapel  and  for  school  gatherings  too  large  to  be  accom- 
modated in  the  school-room.  The  lot  on  which  the  school- 
room was  erected  was  deeded  to  the  trustees  for  the  purposes 
of  a  union  school;  it  is  now  included  in  the  cemetery  of  the 
Methodist  church.  This  union  school  or  seminary  continued 
in  existence,  though  under  different  names,  until  about  the 
year  1833.  In  1825,  under  the  inspiring  action  of  the  Gen- 
eral Conference  of  1820  on  the  subject  of  education,  the 
Pittsburg  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church 
took  the  incipient  steps  to  found  a  college ;  to  secure  its  lo- 
cation in  the  old  Methodist  community  of  Uniontown,  the 
trustees  of  the  academy  which  succeeded  the  first,  or  Bishop 
Asbury's,  academy,  tendered  the  building  and  all  other  prop- 


62  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

erty  belonging  to  the  scliool  to  the  commission  to  select  a 
location  for  the  college. 

The  Union  School  founded  in  1792,  in  which,  in  1796, 
John  E.  Reynolds  was  professor  of  languages,  in  1826 
became 

MADISON   COLLEGE, 

under  the  patronage  of  the  Pittsburg  Annual  Conference. 
Henry  B.  Bascom,  D.D,  was  president  and  professor  of  moral 
science ;  Charles  Elliott,  D.D.,  professor  of  languages ;  J.  H. 
Fielding,  D.D.,  professor  of  mathematics.  Dr.  Bascom 
continued  in  the  presidency  about  three  years,  and  was  suc- 
ceeded by  Dr.  Fielding.  The  professorship  of  mathematics 
was  then  filled  by  Rev.  Dr.  John  Clark. 

The  college,  under  the  direction  of  these  distinguished 
professors,  enjoyed  a  few  years  of  prosperity,  and  educated 
several  men  who  became  distinguished  in  future  years.  It 
imparted  a  vigorous  impulse  to  collegiate  learning  in  the  Con- 
ference, but  waned  before  the  greater  light  of  Allegheny 
College,  at  Meadville,  which,  in  1833,  became  a  Methodist 
institution.  The  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  withdrew  from 
Madison  College  in  1832.  The  building  was  afterward  used 
as  a  college  of  the  Methodist  Protestant  Church,  subsequent- 
ly as  a  female  college,  then  as  a  school  for  the  orphans  of  sol- 
diers.   Now  it  is  rendered  useful  as  a  private  family  residence. 

Bishop  Asburj^'s  "  Union  Seminary,"  under  several  names 
and  boards  of  control,  continued  as  a  Methodist  school  for 
about  forty  years.  That  great  and  good  man.  Bishop  Simp- 
son, was  an  alumnus  of  Madison  College. 

The  notice  of  Madison  College  by  Rev.  Dr.  Bangs,  in  the 
third  volume  of  his  valuable  history  of  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church,  is  so  judicious,  and  his  reflections  upon  the 
indispcnsability  of  endowments  for  our  schools  are  so  impor- 


Union  School  and  Madison  College.  G3 

tant,  that  all  friends  of  education  should  feel  their  force  and 
do  their  duty  in  the  premises. 

"  The  Pittsburg  Conference  made  an  attempt  to  establish 
a  collegiate  institution  within  its  bounds,  called  Madison 
College,  and  the  Hev.  Henry  B.  Bascom  was  appointed  its 
president.  It  was  located  in  Uniontown,  Fayette  County,  in 
the  State  of  Pennsylvania.  It  went  into  operation  under 
favorable  auspices,  and  was  incorporated  in  1827  by  the 
Legislature  of  the  State.  It  did  not,  however,  long  continue. 
Its  endown:ient  was  small,  and  the  number  of  students  was 
by  no  means  adequate  to  its  support. 

"  Hence,  though  blessed  with  an  able  faculty,  its  dissolu- 
tion affords  another  evidence  of  the  impracticability  of  sus- 
taining collegiate  institutions  without  ample  endowments. 
How  else  can  this  be  done  ?  The  price  of  tuition  is  neces- 
sarily so  low,  in  the  various  literary  institutions  of  our  country, 
that  an  attempt  to  raise  it  sufficiently  high  to  meet  the  ex- 
pense of  instruction,  and  other  incidental  expenses,  would  be 
to  debar  all  students  from  an  entrance  into  their  inclosures; 
and  it  is  equally  impossible  to  sustain  them  from  the  ordinary 
prices  of  tuition  and  board  ;  and  hence  the  absolute  necessity 
of  ample  endowments,  either  from  the  State  or  by  the  more 
sure  methods  of  annual  collections,  in  order  to  keep  them  in 
successful  operation.  Of  this  all  must  be  sensible,  and,  there- 
fore all  who  feel  an  interest  in  the  prosperity  of  these  institu- 
tions must,  if  they  would  have  them  permanently  established, 
contribute  liberally  for  their  support." 

Madison  College  did  not,  as  our  venerable  historian  sup- 
posed it  had,  cease  to  exist;  but  from  it  evolved  that 
grand  institution,  Allegheny  College.  The  Bishop's  "Union 
School,"  with  Brother  Conaway  performing  the  double  duty 
of  presiding  elder  on  a  large  mountain  district,  and,  at  the 


04  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

same  time,  rendering  service  "  as  manager,"  passed  tlirougli 
numerous  evolutions,  but  at  last  attained  to  full  maturity, 
and,  riclilj  endowed  by  the  generosity  of  numerous  friends, 
it  is  likely  to  stand  until  the  dawning  of  the  day  when 
knowledge  shall  be  universal,  and" when  "they  shall  teach 
no  more  every  man  his  neighbor,  ...  for  all  shall  know  the 
Lord." 


Wesley  and  Wiiitefield  School.  65 


CHAPTEE  YI. 

WESLEY  AND  WHITEFIELD  SCHOOL,  GEORGIA. 

"While  Bishop  Asbury  was  yet  struggling  under  the  bur- 
den of  Cokesbury  College,  and  earnestly  laboring  for  its  suc- 
cess, he  was  laying  plans  for  schools  in  other  parts  of  the 
country. 

March  12,  1789,  he  wrote  in  his  Journal :  "  Our  Confer- 
ence began  at  Grant's,  Ga.  On  Thursday  we  appointed  a 
committee  to  procure  five  hundred  acres  of  land  for  the 
establishment  of  a  school  in  the  State  of  Georgia." 

Bishop  Coke  was  also  present  at  this  Conference.  He 
varies  the  details  a  little,  but  records  the  important  fact  that 
a  school  was  to  be  founded.     He  says : 

"  At  this  Conference  we  agreed  to  build  a  school  in 
Georgia.  Our  friends  have  agreed  to  secure  at  least  two 
thousand  acres  of  land  for  its  support.  A  subscription  was 
made  in  one  conojreoration  of  twelve  thousand  five  hundred 
pounds  of  tobacco,  worth,  clear  of  all  expenses,  five  hundred 
dollars." 

On  returning  to  Georgia  tlie  next  year  Bishop  Asbury 
found  that,  though  the  enterprise  had  not  been  abandoned, 
but  little  progress  had  been  made.  The  two  thousand  acres 
of  land,  promised  to  Bishop  Coke,  had  not  been  secured. 
Accompanied  by  his  friend,  Hope  Hull,  he  "  went  to  view 
four  hundred  acres  of  land,  and  found  it  not  suitably  located 
for  a  seminary  of  learning." 

A  few  days  later  he  entered  in  his  Journal :  "  We  have 
the  prospect  of  obtaining  a  hundred  acres  of  land  for  every 


6(}  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

one  hundred  pounds  that  we  can  raise  and  pay  for  the  sup- 
port of  Wesley  and  Whitefield  School."  This  is  the  sub- 
stance of  all  that  was  written  by  the  Bishops  in  regard  to 
this  projected  school  for  the  great  South-west.  Supposing 
that  there  was  something  more  of  it,  either  as  an  accom- 
plished fact  or  indirectly  in  its  influences  on  other  literary 
undertakings,  after  many  other  fruitless  endeavors  to  learn 
what  came  of  this  beginning,  and  what  connection,  if  any,  it 
had  with  the  later  Church  schools  in  the  Empire  State  of 
the  South,  I  addressed  a  series  of  inquiries  to  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Haygood,  so  favorably  known  in  all  parts  of  the  country  as 
the  president  of  Emory  College.  Unable  to  answer  himself. 
Dr.  Haygood  very  kindly  referred  me  to  Rev.  G.  G.  Smith, 
D.  D.,  at  Madison,  Ga.,  assuring  me  "  that  what  Dr.  Smith 
did  not  know  of  Georgia  Methodism,  of  both  the  earlier  and 
the  later  times,  I  need  not  inquire  about."  Dr.  Smith's 
answer  reached  me  through  *'Zion's  Herald" of  Feb.  Y,  1883, 
as  follows :  "  Rev.  A.  W.  Cummings,  whose  letter  reached 
me  just  as  I  was  starting  for  Florida,  and  whose  address  I 
have  lost,  writes  me,  making  inquiries  as  to  the  Wesley  and 
Whitefield  School,  Georgia,  of  which  he  finds  mention  in 
Bishop  Asbury's  Journal.  Rev.  Daniel  Stevenson,  of  Ken- 
tucky, speaks  of  this  school  as  having  been  established ;  in 
this  he  is  mistaken. 

"  The  first  stronghold  that  Methodism  gained  in  Georgia 
was  among  the  immigrants  from  Virginia,  who  settled  in 
Wilkps  County.  Methodism  came  to  the  State  in  1785,  and 
a  short  time  after  that  Hope  Hull  came.  He  was  a  Mary- 
lander,  a  warm  personal  friend  of  Bisliop  Asbury.  He,  no 
doubt,  had  much  to  do  with  the  planning  of  Wesley  and 
Whitefield  School.  A  subscription  was  circulated,  taking 
payment  in  money,  cattle,  rice,  and  tobacco.     Bishop  Asbury 


Wesley  and  Whitefield  School.  67 

rode  with  Hull  to  examine  some  land  offered  to  the 
school.  But  the  institution  never  went  into  effect — was  not 
opened." 

In  a  subsequent  private  letter,  Dr.  Smith  assigns  some  rea- 
sons for  the  failure  of  this  project,  and  gives  some  interest- 
ing provisions  made  by  the  Bishop  and  the  Church  to  supply 
the  educational  wants  of  that  region.  He  says  :  "Before  the 
plans  of  the  Bishop  and  his  helpers  for  establishing  the 
Wesley  and  Whitetield  School  could  be  carried  into  effect,  a 
great  calamity  befell  the  Churcli  in  tliat  region.  Beverly 
Allen,  long  the  most  brilliant  and  popular  preacher  in  Geor- 
gia and  South  Carolina,  fell  into  disgrace  and  sin,  and  was, 
after  full  investigation,  expelled  from  the  Church  and  from 
the  ministry.  Some  time  after  his  expulsion  the  sheriff  of 
the  county  came  to  arrest  him  on  a  warrant,  on  account  of 
the  crime  for  which  he  had  been  deposed  from  the  Church. 
Allen  refused  to  be  arrested,  and  warned  the  officer  not  to 
come  near  him  or  attempt  the  arrest.  Not  heeding  the 
warning,  Allen  shot  him  dead.  He  immediately  fled  from 
the  State.  He  made  his  way  to  what  was  called  the  dark 
corner,  in  Kentucky.  There,  in  the  practice  of  medicine, 
and  in  teaching  a  common  school,  he  spent  some  years,  and 
he  there  died  a  miserable  death,  in  despair  of  God's  mercy. 
In  consequence  of  this  untoward  event,  the  membership  of 
the  Church  decreased  one  half,  and  the  plans  for  the  school 
were  given  up. 

"  Some  years  after,  Hope  Hull  himself,  at  Bishop  Asbury's 
request,  located  and  opened  a  school.  He  secured  the  serv- 
ices of  two  line  classical  scholars  as  assistants ;  one  of  them 
was  Professor  Barton  W.  Stone,  the  name  of  the  other  is  not 
remembered.  He  also  employed,  as  teacher  of  French,  a 
well  educated  native,  recently  from  Paris,  by  the  name  of 


68  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Francis  Auburn.  To  this  school,  which  opened  auspiciously 
with  seventy  students,  William  H.  Crawford,  one  of  the 
great  men  of  Georgia,  went  for  classical  training.  The 
sturdy  German,  Rev.  Lewis  Meyers,  who  did  so  much  for 
Georgia  Methodism  in  that  section,  received  his  training  in 
English  in  this  school.  This  was  the  first  Methodist  semi- 
nary of  learning  in  Georgia.  It  accomplished  a  good  work 
for  the  Church." 

How  long  Mr.  Hull's  seminary  continued  open  is  not  cer- 
tain. All  having  any  knowledge  of  it  agree  that  it  was  con- 
ducted with  the  energy  and  ability  w^hicli  distinguished  its 
principal  in  all  his  undertakings.  Hope  Hull  was  one  of  the 
great  men  of  early  Methodism.  "  The  Cyclopedia  of  Meth- 
odism" informs  us,  that  "it  w^as  chiefly  through  his  exertions 
that  the  first  respectable  brick  building  was  erected  in  Wash- 
ington, Ga.,  designed  to  be  used  as  an  academy." 

Was  this  to  have  been  Wesley  and  Whitefield  Seminary  ? 
Washington,  Wilkes  County,  was  the  center  of  Methodism 
in  Georgia  for  many  years.  It  afforded  Hull  a  noble  field 
for  the  exercise  of  his  abilities,  both  as  a  preacher  and  teacher. 
In  these  capacities  he  was  widely  known,  highly  esteemed, 
and  accomplished  a  great  work.  In  this  county,  in  later 
times,  that  pulpit  prodigy  and  distinguished  educator.  Dr. 
Stephen  Olin,  achieved  such  success  in  the  pulpit  as  laid  the 
foundation  of  his  future  fame  in  the  South.  Without  any 
reference  to  his  own  agency  in  the  work.  Dr.  Olin  gave  an 
account  of  it  in  a  letter  to  one  of  his  former  college  friends. 
He  wrote :  "  You  have  probably  heard  of  the  great  revival  in 
Washington,  Wilkes  County,  Ga.  I  have  never  witnessed 
such  a  scene  before.  About  one  hundred  persons  are  jDro- 
fessed  converts  in  that  place,  and  only  two  or  three  persons 
in  the  town  are  left  unconcerned.     What  is  singular,  the 


"Wesley  and  Whitefield  School.  69 

subjects  of  the  work  are  generally  the  first  in  wealth  and 
standing  in  the  community." 

His  biograplier  says :  "  A  sermon  preached  by  Dr.  Olin  in 
Washington,  Ga.,  is  still  referred  to  by  a  number  of  distin- 
guished citizens  as  having  led  to  their  conversion.  It  was  tho 
yunctum  saliens  of  the  revival.  Hull  finally  closed  his  sem- 
inary at  Washington  and  removed  to  Athens,  to  aid,  says  Dr. 
Abel  Stevens,  in  founding  in  that  city  the  State  University, 
w^iich  for  many  years  was  regarded  as  a  semi-Methodist  col- 
lege. He  was,  for  a  time,  its  acting  president,  and,  as  long 
as  he  lived,  the  most  active  and  influential  member  of  its 
board  of  trustees.  As  a  member  of  the  prudential  committee, 
he  exerted  great  influence  in  selecting  professors." 

Here  Stephen  Olin  spent  seven  of  the  best  years  of  his  life. 

The  circumstances  narrated  show  that,  directly  or  indirect- 
ly, Bishop  Asbury  had  an  important  agency  in  the  establish- 
ment of  the  State  University  of  Georgia,  as  he  did  in  the 
organization  of  tlie  State  College  of  South  CaroHna,  and, 
perhaps,  of  North  Carolina.  No  other  clergyman  exerted 
an  equal  influence  in  either  of  those  States  during  the  last 
sixteen  years  of  his  life. 

Rev.  Dr.  Smith,  the  historian  of  the  Georgia  Conference 
of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  South,  to  whom  I  am  so 
nmch  indebted,  gives  a  few  items  in  regard  to  other  schools : 

"  Rev.  John  Andrew,  the  father  of  Bishop  Andrew,  opened 
and  conducted  a  good  school  for  a  number  of  years.  This 
was  the  second  Methodist  school  in  Georgia.  The  Georgia 
Conference  Manual-labor  School,  wliicli  for  a  long  time  was 
quite  influential,  came  next;  from  this  sprang  our  present 
Emory  College — all  the  outcome  of  the  plans  of  Bishop 
Asbury  for  the  Wesley  and  Whitefield  School." 


70  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTER  YII. 

COKESBURY  SCHOOL,  NORTH  CAROLINA. 

Years  before  Metliodism  was  organized  as  a  Clmrcli  in 
America,  amid  the  terrible  convulsions  of  tlie  Revolutionary 
War,  the  thoughts  of  Mr.  Asburj  were  occupied  with  the 
future  of  this  country.  To  aid  in  its  evangelization  he  had 
sacrificed  father,  mother,  and  all  else  that  he  revered  and 
loved  in  the  fatherland.  Though  left  by  all  his  English 
fellow-evangelists,  who,  on  the  commencement  of  hostilities, 
returned  to  their  native  land,  he  deliberately  chose  America 
as  the  field  of  his  life's  toils,  sacrifices,  and  sufferings  for  God 
and  human  good.  On  his  annual  tours  of  superintendency, 
as  the  chosen  assistant  of  Mr.  Wesley,  fording  or  swimming 
its  bridgeless  rivers,  scaling  its  vast  mountain  ranges,  expe- 
riencing all  its  vicissitudes  of  climate,  familiar  with  its  great 
variety  of  animal,  vegetable,  and  mineral  products,  he  was 
profoundly  impressed  with  the  great  future  that  he  saw  was 
soon  to  be  revealed.  To  his  faith,  also,  was  clearly  revealed 
the  grand  mission  of  Methodism  in  this  land  of  immense 
natural  advantages.  Hence,  while  yet  but  the  untitled 
preacher,  the  unordained  assistant  of  the  absent  Mr.  Wesley, 
in  superintending  the  societies  in  America,  he  was  laying 
plans  for  the  future  of  the  Church  that,  in  the  ordei*  of 
God's  providence,  he  saw  would  be  organized  in  this,  then, 
wilderness  land.  He  left  England  with  a  high  estimate  of 
the  educational  movement  of  the  British  Methodists.  In 
his  Journal,  under  date  of  November  30,  1779,  he  wrote : 
"  We  spent  an  evening  [himself  and  a  brother  itinerant]  at 


CoKESBUKY  School.  71 

widow  Bready's,  and  had  some  talk  about  erecting  a  Kings- 
wood  School  in  America." 

A  few  months  later  ]ie  was  in  North  Carolina,  this  time  in 
company  with  liis  "  gloomy  countryman  of  great  piety,  great 
skill  in  learning,  who  drinks  in  Greek  and  Latin  swiftly, 
yet  prays  much,  and  walks  closely  with  God."  This  pious, 
learned,  gloomy  friend  was  the  subsequently  very  notable 
John  Dickins,  a  graduate  of  Eton  College,  England,  one  of 
the  most  able  preachers  of  the  early  years  of  Methodism ; 
also  a  skilled  business  man.  He  became  the  founder  of  the 
great  American  publishing  house  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church.  The  talked-of  Kingswood  School  for  America  still 
occupied  the  thoughts  of  Mr.  Asbury. 

On  the  15th  of  June,  1780,  Mr.  Dickins  drew  up,  at  Mr. 
Asbury's  request,  a  subscription  to  raise  funds  to  erect  such 
an  institution.  "This,"  says  Dr.  Abel  Stevens,  "was  the 
first  project  of  a  literary  institution  among  American  Meth- 
odists." "This,"  continued  Mr.  Asbury,  "was  what  came 
out  a  college.  In  the  subscription  printed  by  Dr.  Coke, 
Gabriel  Long  and  Brother  Bustion  w^ere  the  first  subscribers. 
I  trust  this  [undertaking]  may  be  for  the  glory  of  God  and 
the  good  of  thousands." 

Events  crowd  upon  each  other. 

The  Declaration  of  Independence,  promulgated  by  the 
Americans  four  years  before  this  subscription  was  dated,  has 
been  made  effective  by  the  surrender  of  the  British  forces  at 
Yorktown.  The  independence  of  America  is  publicly 
acknowledged  by  Great  Britain  and  the  other  great  powers 
of  Europe.  The  late  provinces,  subordinate  to  a  govern- 
ment on  the  other  side  of  the  Atlantic,  are  now  sovereign 
States  of  the  great  Confederacy.  Methodism  in  America  is 
an  independent  Church.     The  humble  unordained  preacher 


72  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

has  ill  a  day  passed  tlirongli  tlie  subordinate  offices  of  deacon 
and  elder  by  election  and  the  imposition  of  hands,  and  now 
is  the  regularly  consecrated  and  duly  commissioned  episcapos 
of  American  Methodism,  and  by  the  Church  and  world  he  is 
now  hailed  as  Bishop  Asbury.  He  is  still,  however,  the 
same  humble,  zealous  minister  of  Christ.  The  projected 
school  for  ISTorth  Carolina  is  not  forgotten  or  given  up, 
though  the  original  subscription  has  been  used  for  a  larger 
undertaking. 

The  English  name  Kingswood  is  exchanged  for  one  more 
euphonious  to  American  ears,  Cokesbury.  JS'o  means  are 
available  for  determining  when  this  school  opened  or  closed ; 
that  it  did  open  is  certain.  April  2,  1794,  Bishop  Asbury 
entered  in  his  Journal :  "  Came  to  E.'s  meeting-house,  near 
Hunting  Creek,  in  Surry  County,  !N".  C.  After  preaching 
I  came  to  Cokesbury  School,  near  Hardy  Jones's.  It  is 
twenty  feet  square,  two  stories  high,  well  set  out  with  doors 
and  windows.  This  house  is  not  too  large,  as  some  others 
are.  It  stands  on  a  beautiful  eminence  overlooking  the  low- 
lands and  the  Yadkin  Eiver."  The  doors  and  glazed  win- 
dows attracted  the  Bishop's  attention,  as  well  they  might. 
Few  school-houses  and  churches  in  North  Carolina  of  that 
day  had  them,  nor  do  they  all  yet  have  them. 

Three  fourths  of  a  century  later  the  writer  counted  it  no 
small  honor  to  stand  in  some  of  the  same  pulpits  that  Bishop 
Asbury  occupied  in  that  State,  and  preach  Christ  crucified 
to  some  of  the  same  hearers  who  in  youth  listened  to  the 
pioneer  Bishop  in  churches  that  never  had  a  window,  or  a 
shutter  to  the  opening  through  the  logs  called  a  door.  The 
large  chimney  to  the  open  fire-place,  an  opening  made  by 
cutting  out  two  or  three  feet  of  a  log  behind  the  preacher, 
and  about  on  a  level  with  his  head,  to  afford  light  to  read 


CoKESBURY  School.  73 

the  hymns  and  the  text,  together  witli  numerous  openings 
between  the  logs,  afforded  free  ventilation,  as  well  as  admit- 
ted the  voice  of  the  preacher  to  reach  the  frequently  larger 
number  of  hearers  without  than  within. 

Thirty  years  later  the  subsequently  eminent  Dr.  Stephen 
Olin  did  his  first  work  as  a  teacher  in  South  Carolina  in 
an  academy  that  had  no  windows.  How  welcome  to  the 
Church  would  be  a  full  record  of  this  school,  whose  edifice, 
location,  and  scenery  are  so  minutely  described  by  the  good 
Bishop ;  who  were  its  first  teachers,  who  its  students,  who  its 
patrons  and  benefactors !  These  items  of  information  may 
never  be  secured. 

The  Bishop  visited  this  seat  of  learning  at  a  later  date. 
That  he  approved  it,  as  doing  a  good  work,  is  evident  from 
the  fact  that  in  1794  he  took  a  presiding  elder  from  his  dis- 
trict, and  appointed  him  the  principal  of  this  Cokesbury 
School.  At  that  date  neither  custom  nor  law  allowed  a 
preacher  to  remain  in  the  same  charge  more  than  one  year. 
In  1705  James  Park  located ;  tiie  presumption  is  that  he  did 
this  that  he  might  continue  his  labors  in  the  Cokesbury 
School,  of  which  he  was  made  the  principal  the  preceding 
year.  This  school  is  not  mentioned  by  any  of  our  Church 
historians ;  and  yet  it  may  have  been  the  pioneer  academy, 
that  prepared  the  way  for  that  greater  light  which  arose  in 
an  adjoining  county  soon  after.  The  North  Carolina  Uni- 
versity opened  its  halls  in  1795.  In  the  spring  of  1800  the 
Bishop  viisited  this,  in  after  years  famous,  seat  of  learning, 
and  preached  in  its  chapel.  He  made  this  note  of  the  event, 
a  very  different  one  from  that  made  nine  years  previous, 
when  he  visited  Yale  College,  in  Connecticut :  "  We  were 
treated  with  great  respect  at  the  university  [North  Carolina] 
by  President  Caldwell,  the  students,  citizens,  and  many  of 


Y4  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

the  country  people.  When  the  university  is  finished  I  shall 
take  notice  of  it.  The  Bishop  left  his  blessing  and  passed 
on.  God's  blessing  followed.  The  prosperity  of  this  old 
home  of  learning  and  good  morals  was  somewhat  checked  by 
the  late  internecine  war,  but  seems  again  to  have  recov- 
ered much  of  its  former  success.  Of  Cokesbury  School, 
North  Carolina,  no  additional  information  has  been  obtained, 
though  diligently  sought. 


Bethel  Academy.  75 


CHAPTER  YIII. 

BETHEL   ACADEMY,  MOUNT   BETHEL,  NEWBERRY  COUNTY,  S.  C. 

The  subject  of  scliools  early  engaged  the  attention  of  the 
people  of  South  Carolina.  The  General  Assembly  of  1785 
chartered  three  colleges,  one  at  Winnsborough,  another  at 
Cambridge,  and  a  third  at  Charles  Town.  Cambridge  was  in 
Abbeville  County,  near  the  future  Tabernacle  Academy  of 
the  Methodist  Church.     Two  years  later  the 

college  of  alexandrla. 

was  chartered  in  Pinckney  County.  This  lofty  name  did 
not  avail  to  secure  its  success,  and  the  College  of  Alexandria 
died  at  its  birth.  The  same  was  true  of  the  college  at  Cam- 
bridge. Winnsborough  flourished  for  a  time. '  Charleston 
College  still  exists.  The  most  useful  of  the  early  South 
Carolina  schools  was  that  at  Mount  Bethel,  now  to  be  noticed. 
Our  Methodist  historians  either  failed  to  notice  this  institu- 
tion, or,  which  is  more  probable,  they  applied  the  language 
of  Bishop  Asbury  in  regard  to  it  to  the  school  of  the  same 
name  in  Kentucky.  The  editor  of  the  Bishop's  Journal,  in 
the  index  found  in  the  third  volume,  does  this.  Misled, 
probably,  by  this  index,  the  author  of  "  The  Centennial 
History  of  American  Methodism  "  has  fallen  into  the  same 
error. 

While  at  the  home  of  his  life-long  fiiend,  Edward  Finch, 
the  sterling  Methodist  magistrate  of  Newberry  County,  S.  C, 
March  7,  1793,  Bishop  Asbury  entered  in  his  Journal : 
"  Preached  at  F.'s  [Finch's].      I  consulted  the  minds  of  our 


76  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

brethren  about  building  a  house  for  Conference,  preaching, 
and  a  district  school ;  but  I  have  no  ground  to  believe  that 
our  well-laid  plan  will  be  executed — our  preachers  are 
unskillful,  and  our  friends  have  little  money." 

Passing  on  amid  rain  and  high  waters  the  next  day,  in 
Union  County,  he  seems  to  have  met  greater  encouragement. 
He  made  this  entry  in  his  Journal :  "  I  next  day  preached  to 
a  few  people  at  the  open  meeting-house,  with  some  spiritual 
opening  and  sweetness.  We  were  closely  employed  in  writ- 
ing subscriptions  for  the  district  school,  and  copies  of  the 
constitutions." 

These  were  the  inceptive  steps  in  an  enterprise  that  was 
crowned  with  a  larger  measure  of  success  than  any  other  of 
the  good  Bishop's  educational  undertakings.  Having  taken 
these  steps  and  received  assurances  of  co-operation  from  both 
preachers  and  people,  he  left  the  matter  in  their  hands,  and 
pressed  forward  on  his  grand  round  of  visitation  to  the 
Churches  and  Conferences  in  every  State  then  constituting 
the  Union. 

March  19,  1795,  the  Bishop  is  again  at  the  seat  of  Bethel 
Academy,  South  Carolina.  The  friends  of  the  enterprise 
have  been  faithful  to  the  trust.  The  school  building,  two 
stories  high,  twenty  by  forty  feet  on  the  ground,  giving  on 
the  first  floor  two  rooms  twenty  feet  square,  with  a  fire- 
place in  each,  and  the  second  story  divided  into  dormitories 
for  the  use  of  students,  the  Bishop  finds  up  and  inclosed, 
and  so  far  completed  tliat  it  can  be  used  for  preaching — one 
of  the  original  purposes  for  which  it  was  erected.  This  is 
the  entry  in  his  Journal : 

''Thursday^  19th,  and  the  two  following  days,  we  had  work 
enough  to  write  subscription  papers  to  be  sent  abroad  for  the 
purpose  of  collecting  one  hundred  pounds  to  finish  Bethel 


Bethel  Academy.  77 

Scliool  and  to  secure  the  land  ;  but  mj  expectations  are 
small — the  people  have  so  little  sense  of  God  and  religion. 

"  Saturday,  I  opened  the  new  house  [Bethel  Academy] 
with  a  sermon  on  1  Thess.  v,  14 ;  and  on  Sunday  we  had  a 
sermon  and  a  love-feast." 

Tiie  language  of  this  quotation,  the  author  of  the  index  to 
the  Bishop's  Journal,  and  also  the  author  of  "The  Centennial 
History  of  Methodism  in  America,"  apply  to  Bethel  School, 
Kentucky.  The  names  of  the  rivers  and  of  the  fords  in  the 
vicinity  show  that  this  was  an  error.  Saluda,  Ennoree,  Tiger, 
and  Broad  are  rivers  of  South  Carolina.  So  are  Crenshaw's 
Ford,  Fish-dam  Ford,  well-known  places  in  that  State. 
Edward  Finch,  Esq.,  has  been  credited  with  having  given 
the  thirty  acres  of  land  surrounding  this  school  edifice,  upon 
which  were  built  residences  for  the  teachers  and  a  boarding- 
house  for  the  pupils.  The  Bishop's  language  indicates  that 
a  money  consideration  was  connected  with  the  transaction. 

The  next  notice  of  this  institution  by  Bishop  Asbury  is  a 
little  more  than  a  year  later.  He  then  wTote,  April  30, 
179G  :  '*  We  had  a  meeting  of  the  trustees  of  Bethel  School, 
and  it  was  agreed  that  it  should  be  a  free  school,  and  that 
only  the  English  tongue  and  the  sciences  should  be  taught." 

This  feature  of  the  curriculum  was  soon  changed,  and,  as 
will  soon  appear,  it  became  the  finest  classical  school  in  the 
State.  Eev.  Dr.  Atkinson  supposed  the  trustee  meeting  and 
the  rule  enacted  referred  to  Bethel  School,  Kentucky.  A 
careful  reading  of  the  Bishop's  Journal  will  disclose  the 
error. 

The  decision  to  make  it  Vifree  school,  rendered  necessary 
some  provision  for  supporting  the  teacher  or  teachers.  The 
Bishop  continues  at  the  last  date  to  record  in  his  Journal : 
"  I  drew  up  an  address  on  behalf  of  the  school,  in  order  to 


78  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

raise  three  hundred  dollars  per  annum  to  support  a  president 
teaclier."  With  no  denominational  paper  to  publish  this 
address,  it  was  copied  and  sent  to  the  preachers,  to  be  read 
to  the  congregations  scattered  over  the  large  circuits.  The 
preachers  were  the  agents  to  collect  and  forward  the  money 
to  the  school. 

Probably  this  method  of  support  did  not  long  continue. 
Six  years  later,  at  the  home  of  his  old  friend  Edward  Finch, 
Bishop  Asbury  notices  in  his  Journal  this  institution  for  the 
last  time.  December  3, 1802,  he  wrote :  "  George  Douthet  * 
and  myself  w^ere  engaged  to  put  Mount  Bethel  School  in 
operation.  I  advised  to  finish  the  house  for  teaching  be- 
low, and  for  lodging  above."  -The  Bishop  preached  in  Bethel 
on  several  future  occasions,  but  this  is  the  last  time  that  he 
mentions  the  school  in  his  Journal. 

For  nine  years  it  had  occupied  his  thoughts  and  employed 
his  pen  and  tongue.  Now  in  operation,  he  leaves  the  work 
in  other  hands,  and  the  burden  for  other  shoulders.  The  last 
quotation  from  Bishop  xlsbury's  Journal  implies  that  the 
opening  of  Bethel  Academy,  South  Carolina,  was  subsequent 
to  1802,  when  he  and  George  Dougharty  w^ere  engaged  to 
put  it  in  operation.  It  is  difficult  to  harmonize  this  theory 
with  certain  well-authenticated  facts. 

Professor  Maximilian  La  Borde,  M.  D.,  w^ho  for  nearly 
fifty  years  as  student,  trustee,  or  professor  was  const:.ntly 
connected  with  South  Carolina  College,  chartered  in  1801, 
and  changed  to  South  Carolina  University  in  18GG,  in  his 
able  work,  "  The  History  of  South  Carolina  College  "  (8vo, 

*  An  undoubted  error.  There  was  no  George  Douthet  in  the  South  Caro- 
lina Conference.  George  Dougharty  was  at  that  date  the  presiding  elder  of 
the  Sahida  District,  which  included  Newberry,  tlie  seat  of  BethL-1  Academy. 
See  General  Minutes,  1802. 


Bethel  x\cademy.  79 

p.  463),  furnislies  these  items  of  iuforination  in  regard  to  one 
of  the  teachers  in  Bethel  Acadeniy :  "  Eiisha  llanunond  was 
born  in  New  Bedford,  Mass.,  October  10th,  1774.  He  was 
graduated  at  Dartmouth  College  in  1802.  He  came  to  South  f 
Carolina  in  1803-4,  and  was  immediately  engaged  as  princi- 
pal of  Mount  Bethel  Academy,  in  Xewberry,  which  was  estab- 
lished by  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church."  This,  beyond  con- 
troversy, fixes  the  date  of  Professor  Hammond's  connection 
with  Bethel.  Another  fact,  established  on  the  authority  of 
Dr.  La  Borde,  is,  that  early  in  January,  1805,  a  number  of 
young  men  entered  South  Carolina  College,  thoroughly  pre- 
pared, some  for  the  Freshmen  and  a  few  for  the  Sophomore 
class  at  Bethel  Academy.  Sach  work  would  have  required  a 
longer  period  than  from  1803-4  to  January  1,  1805. 

Albert  M.  Shipp,  \^.\^.^  late  president  of  WoEord  College, 
Spartanburg,  S.  C,  now  professor  in  Yanderbilt  University, 
Nashville,  Tenn.,  in  his  interesting  "History  of  Method- 
ism in  South  Carolina,"  says  that  Professor  Hammond  suc- 
ceeded Eev.  Mark  Moore  as  principal.  If  so,  then  Bethel 
Aciidemy  nmst  have  opened  eai'lior  than  1802.  I  incline  to 
the  theory,  in  the  absence  of  positive  testimony,  that  soon 
after  dedication  by  the  Bishop,  in  1795,  and  before  the  trustee 
meeting  at  which  it  was  determined  that  no  tuition  fees 
should  be  charged,  while  the  building  was  yet  unfinished,  a 
school  was  opened.  In  the  mild  climate  of  Newberry  dis- 
trict (county)  a  room  twenty  feet  square,  finished  on  the  out- 
side, having  a  floor,  and  a  good  fire-place  well  supj)lied  with 
fuel,  would  not  be  uncomfortable  for  a  school  without  ceiling 
or  plaster.  This  school  may  for  some  reason — the  resignation 
of  the  teachei's,  perhaps — have  been  suspended.  In  180S  the 
Bishop  and  George  Dougharty  may  have  been  appointed  a 
connnittee  to  re-organize  and  put  the  school  again  in  operation. 


80  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

From  no  one  of  the  five  authors  now  before  me,  all  giving 
accounts  of  Bethel  School,  can  I  fix  the  date  of  its  opening. 
If  mj  readers  are  left  in  the  same  condition  of  uncertainty, 
it  will  be  less  surpi-ising,  as  I  take  up  the  subject  far  remote 
in  time  and  place,  while  some  of  my  predecessors  wrote  near 
the  time  and  place  of  the  occurrence. 

"  The  school,"  says  Rev.  Professor  Shipp,  D.D.,  "  was 
for  six  years  under  the  rectorship  of  the  Rev.  Mark  Moore,  a 
man  eminently  qualified  for  the  post,  assisted  by  two  teach- 
ers, Messrs.  Smith  and  Hammond.  At  the  close  of  his 
term  of  service  Mr.  Moore  resigned,  and  took  charge  of  a 
school  in  Columbia,  where,  by  his  infiuence  and  preaching 
ability,  which  was  of  the  first  order,  he  materially  aided  in 
the  permanent  establishment  of  Methodism.  On  the  retire- 
ment of  Mr.  Moore,  Mr.  Hammond,  father  of  Governor 
Hammond,  took  charge  of  the  school,  and  taught  it  with  sin- 
gular ability  for  many  years.  Mount  Bethel  was  largely 
patronized,  and  had  students  from  Georgia  and  North  Caro- 
lina. A  number  of  the  leading  men  of  South  Carolina  were 
prepared  for  college  at  Mount  Bethel." 

This  is  the  substance  of  all  that  Methodist  writers  have  to 
say  of  Bethel  Academy.  Fortunately  we  have  more  com- 
plete information  from  disinterested  witnesses  without  the 
pale  of  Methodism. 

Dr.  David  Ramsey,  a  High-Church  Episcopalian,  the  his- 
torian of  South  Carolina,  who  wrote  at  near  tlie  opening  of 
this  century,  says :  "  In  I^ewberry  District  there  are  two  veiy 
respectable  academies.  Tliey  were  originated  and  have  been 
carried  on  with  much  spirit.  Bethel  Academy  is  under  the 
patronage  of  the  Methodist  Society,  and  is  much  indebted  to 
the  zeal  of  the  Rev.  Mr.  Dorothy,  deceased.  It  is  situated 
in  a  populous,  pleasant,  and  wealthy   neighborliood,  and  as 


Bethkl  Academy.  81 

tlie  gentlemen  of  the  vicinity  feel  a  zeal  for  its  welfare,  they 
keep  plentiful  boarding  at  a  reasonable  price.  This  academy 
has  seventy  or  eighty  students.  It  is  generally  filled  by  a 
respectable  teacher." 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Dorothy,  here  so  honorably  mentioned 
by  Dr.  Ramsey,  was  intended  for  Rev.  George  Dougharty, 
who  for  several  years  was  an  able  preacher  and  presiding 
elder  in  South  Carolina.  He  died  in  1807.  He  was  Bishop 
Asbury's  principal  ministerial  helper  in  building  Bethel 
Academy. 

That  distingnislied  jurist  and  Christian  gentleman,  mem- 
ber of  the  Baptist  Church,  the  late  Judge  Belton  O'Neal,  in 
liis  "Annals  of  Newberry,"  says:  "  In  this  part  of  the  district 
(Newberry)  was  one  of  the  best  classical  schools  in  the  upper 
part  of  the  State.  It  belonged  to  the  Methodist  Church,  and 
from  Ramsey's  *  History  of  South  Carolina'  we  learn  that 
to  the  Rev.  Mr.  Dougharty  are  we  mainly  indebted  for  that 
fine  institution  of  learning,  the  Mount  Bethel  Academy. 
Elisha  Hammond,  the  father  of  Governor  Hammond,  was 
its  first  principal  teacher."  * 

Judge  O'Neal  proceeds  to  say :  "  It  gave  to  the  country 
such  men  as  Judge  Crenshaw,  Walter  Crenshaw,  Chancel- 
lor William  Harper,  Wesley  Harper,  John  Caldwell,  Dr. 
George  Glenn,  John  R.  Golding,  Governor  Richard  Manning, 
John  Brown,  Dr.  Thomas  Smith,  of  Society  Hill,  Judge 
N.  R.  Evans,  of  Chester,  and  Thomas  Glover,  of  Orange- 
burg. Chancellor  Caldwell  owed  a  sort. of  divided  allegiance 
to  the  Newberry  Academy  and  Mount  Bethel  School,  for 
at  both  places  he  received  parts  of  his  academic  education." 

*  This  statement  is  in  conflict  with  tliat  of  Dr.  A.  M.  Shipp,  who  makes  Pro- 
fessor Hammond  the  successor  to  Rev.  Mark  Moore.    Other  circumstances  indi- 

c:Ue  tlje  correctness  of  Dr.  Shipp.    Still  Judge  O'Neal  is  very  higli  aulhoritj. 
4*. 


82  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

The  Mount  Bethel  Academy  furnished  the  first  students 
and  graduates  of  the  South  Carolina  College.  "  I  may  be 
pardoned,"  continues  Judge  O'Neal,  "  for  recalling  to  the 
memories  of  the  people  of  l^ewberry  District  the  names  of 
two  of  the  principal  foimders  and  patrons  of  Bethel  Academy, 
Charles  Crenshaw  (father  of  Chancellor  Crenshaw  and  Wal- 
ter Crenshaw)  and  Edward  Finch,  both  Methodists,  and  strict, 
uncompromising  Christians.  Finch  was  a  magistrate.  Many 
a  blasphemer  was  made  to  pay  a  shilling  for  each  profane 
oath  uttered  in  his  presence.  The  old  law,  under  which  he 
acted  so  well  for  the  assertion  of  good  morals,  still  exists,  and 
if  it  were  now  and  then  enforced  by  our  worthy  magistrates 
it  would  go  far  to  prevent  the  odious  practice  of  taking  the 
name  of  God  in  vain." 

The  best  test  of  merit  in  an  institution  of  learning  is  the 
work  accomplished,  the  men  it  furnishes  to  the  various  use- 
ful vocations.  Bethel  Academy  was  most  fortunate  in  the 
character  and  achievements  of  its  alumni.  The  late  Dr.  La 
Borde,  the  eminent  historian  of  South  Carolina  University, 
with  whom  the  writer  was  for  some  years  associated  in  the 
faculty  of  that  institution,  makes  this  record  of  one  of  the 
students  of  Bethel  Academy,  who  was  graduated  in  the  first 
class  of  the  South  Carolina  College : 

"  Most  gratifying  is  it  to  me  to  record  that  the  first  person 
admitted  to  the  college  is  one  of  its  most  distinguished 
alumni ;  that  to  the  most  attractive  qualities  of  the  man  he 
added  the  highest  intellectual  endowments;  that  his  genius 
and  learning  have  adorned  the  bench  of  Carolina,  and  that 
lie  is  justly  regarded  as  the  Eld  on  of  the  State.*  I  mean 
William  Harper,  the  late  eminent  chancellor.  The  records 
of  the  faculty  show  that  he  Vv\as  the  first  student  admitted  to 

*  Lord  Eldon  was  among  tl-.e  raoet  distitiguished  Chic f- Justices  of  England. 


Bei'iiel  Acade^q'.  83 

the  College ;  his  brother,  "Wesley,  was  the  second."  Every 
member  of  the  graduating  classes  in  the  South  Carolina  Col- 
lege (now  University)  for  the  years  ISOG  and  1807  were 
young  men  from  Bethel  Academy,  who  had  there  prepared 
for  an  advanced  standing,  and  were  graduated  at  the  end  of 
one  and  two  years  after  the  college  opened,  January,  1805. 
"  So  thorough  a  teacher,"  says  Dr.  La  Borde  (see  his  "  Uistory 
of  South  Carolina  College  "),  "  was  Professor  Haumiond,  the 
distinguished  principal  of  Bethel  Academy,  that  he  became 
known  and  honored  throughout  the  State.  It  was  not  sur- 
prising that  the  tmstees  of  South  Carolina  College  were 
anxious  to  secure  his  services ;  and  he  was  accordingly  elected 
professor  of  languages  in  1805." 

Dr.  La  Borde  did  not  know  Prof.  Hammond  personally, 
but  he  says,  "Judge  Evans,  who  was  his  pupil  at  Bethel  and 
at  Columbia,  informed  me  that  his  reputation  as  a  teacher 
was  very  high.  Ilis  personal  appearance  and  manners  were 
very  captivating,  and  his  popularity  for  a  period  of  his  con- 
nection with  the  college  was  scarcely  inferior  to  that  of  Dr. 
Maxey,"  the  first  and  most  popular  president.  Such  was  the 
principal  of  Bishop  Asbury's  South  Carolina  school  during 
the  years  of  its  greatest  success.  Professor  Hammond's  re- 
tirement from  Bethel  Academy,  taking  with  him  to  Co- 
lumbia all  his  ])upils  who  were  prepared  to  enter  the  college, 
seriously  embarrassed  the  school.  The  neighborhood  felt 
the  depressing  influence  of  the  change.  The  trustees  found 
diliiculty  in  supplying  the  principalship. 

With  the  hope  of  saving  the  Academy,  Professor  Hammond 
resigned  his  position  in  the  College,  and,  on  the  last  day  of 
January,  1807,  retired  from  Columbia,  and  returned  to  New- 
berry and  resumed  his  labors  in  the  Academy.  In  1815  Pro- 
fessor Hammond  took  final  leave  of  the  school  and  removed 


84  Eakly  Schools  of  Metuodism. 

to  Columbia.     lie  died  in  Macon,  Ga.,  on  the  27th  of  Jul}^, 
1829. 

With  varying  fortunes  Bethel  Academy  continued  until 
about  the  year  1820.  Rev.  Dr.  Sliipp  records  it  as  ceasing 
to  exist  at  the  last  date  named.  Other  authorities  considered 
it  as  only  suspended  at  its  original  location,  to  be  re-opened 
at  Mount  Ariel,  in  the  adjoining  district  or  county  of  Abbe- 
ville, under  the  name  of 

TABERNACLE   ACADEMY. 

The  accomplished  young  collegian,  Stephen  Olin,  was  its 
first  and  most  distinguished  principal  after  the  re-opening. 
He  was  graduated  wuth  the  first  honors  of  the  institution  at 
Middlebury  College  in  the  summer  of  1820.  Soon  after,  an 
invalid,  he  started  South  in  quest  of  health.  He  sailed  from 
New  York  city  early  in  the  succeeding  December  for  Savan- 
nah, Ga.,  supposing  a  situation  as  teacher  was  secured  for 
him.  On  reaching  Augusta,  Ga.,  he  learned  that,  on  account 
of  the  report  which  had  reached  the  trustees  of  his  poor 
health,  the  school  promised  him  had  been  given  to  another. 
This  disappointment  left  him  to  seek  an  engagement  else- 
where. He  responded  to  a  call,  made  through  an  Augusta 
paper,  for  a  principal  of  Tabernacle  Academy,  the  successor 
to  Bethel  Academy,  South  Carolina,  and  was  soon  engaged,  at 
seven  hundred  dollars  per -annum  and  board.  On  arriving  at 
the  seat  of  the  school  he  found  the  building  a  solitary  log-house 
in  a  grove  of  pine  trees.  He  describes  it  thus :  "  The  door 
was  hung  on  a  couple  of  sticks."  A  Southern  young  man 
would  have  expressed  it  by  saying  the  door  was  hung  on 
wooden  hinges.  Mr.  Olin  continues :  "  The  windows  were 
miserable.  I  draw  my  table  to  the  wall,  where  I  am  supplied 
with  liirht  that  comes  in  between  the  loirs." 


Bethel  Academy.  85 

This  was  "  tlie  okl  field  school-liouse,"  now  dignified  by 
the  name  of  Academy,  because  tlie  teacher  was  a  collegian, 
who  taught,  if  required,  the  higher  branches  of  learning.  A 
better  building  was  soon  completed  and  occupied  by  the 
young  principal. 

From  the  first  Mr.  Olin  was  delighted  with  his  new  home 
and  new  friends,  and  the  patrons  of  the  school  were  not  long 
in  discovering  that  Providence  had  loaned  them  for  a  season 
no  common  man.  In  his  sprightly  lettei-s  to  friends  he  viv- 
idly describes  his  situation  and  surroundings  : 

"  The  institution  is  wholly  Methodist.  The  trustees  are 
Methodists,  according  to  the  straitest  sect.  I  board  in  a  rich 
family,  live  better  than  in  Savannah  or  Augusta,  have  coffee 
and  "tea  in  Kew  England  style,  good  wheat  bread  and  butter, 
and  a  plentiful  table.  I  am  become  black  and  brawny  even 
beyond  the  habits  of  my  kindred.  Besides  teacliing,  which, 
of  course,  takes  up  most  of  my  time,  I  have  become  an  adept 
at  shooting  with  a  rifle.  I  wander  through  the  woods  for 
many  a  furlong  with  a  gun  on  ray  shoulder  and  a  pack  of 
dogs  at  my  heels,  and  can  wind  a  huntsman's  horn,  the  de- 
light of  *  mongrel,  puppy,  whelp,  and  hound,  and  curs  of  low 
degree.' " 

These  divei-sions,  and  the  invigorating  climate  of  upper 
South  Carolina,  exercised  the  most  favorable  influence  upon 
his  delicate  constitution,  and  encouraged  the  hope  of  perma- 
nent and  vigorous  health.  New  traits  of  character  were  soon 
to  be  developed,  and  new  employments  to  occupy  his  time 
and  thoughts.  He  found  in  South  Carolina  what  he  had  not 
sought  in  his  New  England  home — God's  mercy  in  the  for- 
giveness of  sin,  and  the  witness  of  sonship  in  Jesus  Christ. 
This  happy  change  he  communicated  to  his  father  and  other 
friends,  and  with  it  the  changed  plan  of  life's  work. 


86  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

The  law,  as  a  profession,  was  given  up.  By  the  strong  cords 
of  duty  he  was  drawn  toward  the  ministry  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church.  He  was  a  licensed  preacher  while  yet 
but  a  candidate  for  membership  in  the  Church.  He  became 
an  earnest  revivalist.  While  he  neglected  no  means  to  ad- 
vance his  pupils  in  the  various  studies  upon  which  they  had 
entered,  he  was  equally  zealous  in  winning  them  to  Christ 
and  full  consecration  to  God.  Within  a  few  months  after 
his  conversion  he  was  the  most  popular  preacher  in  the  State 
at  camp-meetings  and  on  other  great  occasions.  In  all  the 
regions  of  Abbeville  and  contiguous  counties  old  people  are 
still  found  who  heard  and  remember  the  early  sermons  of 
the  great  Olin,  and  they  never  weary  in  recounting  the 
effects  produced  by  his  wonderful  ministry.  In  preaching 
he  never  failed  to  become  aroused  himself.  His  hearers 
were  always  captives  carried  away  by  his  magical  fascinations. 

At  the  risk  of  the  charge  of  irrelevancy  I  venture  to  relate 
the  following  incident,  given  to  me  by  an  old  itinerant,  who 
was  an  eye-witness  of  the  occurrence.  Those  who  knew  the 
great  preacher,  eitlier  in  his  earlier  or  later  years,  will  find 
no  difficulty  in  crediting  the  narration.  A  very  short  time 
after  Mr.  Olin  had  received  license  to  preach  he  attended  a 
camp-meeting  held  in  the  vicinity  of  his  school,  Tabernacle 
Academy : 

"On  Saturday  afternoon  the  presiding  elder  put  him  up 
up  to  preach.  He  had  spoken,  a  few  times  before,  to  small 
congregations  in  school-houses  and  country  churches.  JSTow, 
for  the  first  time,  he  faces  a  large  audience,  in  which,  or  on 
the  capacious  stand,  according  to  the  custom  of  that  day, 
were  a  score  or  more  of  the  preachers  from  the  circuits 
around.  As  the  young  collegian,  and  much  younger 
pi-eacher,  opened  his  discourse,  his  unwieldy  form  sliook  like 


Bethel  Academy.  87 

an  aspen  leaf  in  the  wind  through  embarrassment  and  nerv- 
ousness. The  preachers  around  him  on  the  stand  for  a  few 
minutes  found  their  sympathies  most  distressingly  taxed, 
and  looked  for  a  complete  breakdown.  In  a  short  time  he 
gained  the  mastery  over  himself,  and  became  absorbed  with 
his  theme.  His  control  over  his  hearers  became  complete, 
lie  swayed  them,  as  himself  was  swayed,  unconsciously  by 
the  breathinor  thouo:hts  and  burnintr  words  that  rolled  from 
his  lips,  fired  by  tlie  live  coals  from  God's  altar.  The  hearers 
were  enraptured,  carried  away,  scarcely  knowing  whether 
in  the  body  or  out  of  it.  They  groaned  in  agony,  w^ept  in 
sympathy,  rejoiced  in  ecstasy,  or  shouted  in  triumph,  as  the 
tide  of  feeling  rose  or  receded.  The  old  preachers  listened 
in  amazement,  mingled  with  suspicion  that  the  young 
preacher  was  on  stilts,  that  the  sermon  was  borrowed ;  but 
whence,  no  one  ventured  to  guess,  they  had  heard  nothing 
like  it  before. 

*'  The  presiding  elder  was  importuned  to  give  another  op- 
portunity to  judge  of  the  merit  or  demerit  of  the  young 
preacher.  Under  even  more  trying  circumstances  than 
those  of  the  day  before,  Mr.  Olin  agaiu  preached.  An 
immense  congregation  was  seated  at  the  hour  for  morn- 
ing service  on  the  Sabbath.  With  much  of  the  timidity 
of  the  preceding  day,  he  opened  his  discourse.  The  sermon 
and  its  immediate  effects  were  indescribable.  Criticism  w^as 
disarmed,  doubt  was  excluded.  In  the  estimation  of  all 
present  Stephen  Olin  was  the  greatest  preacher  in  South 
Carolina,  if  not  in  America.  From  that  hour,  invalid  as  he 
was.  Dr.  Olin  took  first  rank  airiong  preachers,  and  held  it 
until  his  work  was  done." 

The  late  Bishop  Wightman  said :  "  Never,  in  the  memory 
of  the  oldest  Metliodists,  had  so  powerful  a  preacher  burst 


88  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

with  so  sudden  a  splendor  and  tremendous  an  effect  upon  tlie 
Churcli."  His  work  as  a  teacher  was  equally  successful. 
Tabernacle  Academy  and  its  principal  became  known  far  and 
near.  Students  came  from  all  parts  of  the  South,  eager  to  be 
pupils  of  so  eminent  and  widely  known  a  preceptor.  At 
tlie  end  of  about  tliree  years  Mr.  Olin  resigned  the  princi- 
palship,  leaving  the  school  in  a  high  state  of  prosperity. 

After  some  years  of  varying  success  and  reverse  the  loca- 
tion was  found  not  to  be  a  healthy  one.  Another  removal 
became  necessary.  A  good  site,  about  two  miles  distant,  was 
chosen,  and  a  good  building  erected  ;  and  in  its  new  home, 
under  an  old  popular  Methodist  name,  it  opened  as 

OOKESBURY   CONFERENCE   SCHOOL. 

Under  this  new  name  Bishop  Asbury's  Bethel  Academy 
became  the  school  of  the  South  Carolina  Conference.  It 
gives  free  education  to  the  sons  of  members  of  the  Con- 
ference. 

The  Conference  secured  it  an  endowment  of  about  $18,000. 
Unfortunately  the  managers  of  most  of  the  schools  in  Soutli 
Carolina,  during  the  late  war,  called  in  their  well-invested 
funds,  and  with  them  purchased  eight  per  cent.  Confederate 
bonds.  Wofford  College  sunk  an  endowment  of  $100,000, 
and  Cokesbury  nearly  all  it  had.  Still  both  went  on,  and 
they  yet  go  on  with  yearly  increasing  prosperity. 

Professor  Prichard,  an  alumnus  of  Woiford  College,  was 
the  principal  in  1879.  He  said,  "  Tlie  situation  is  the  best 
in  the  State.  Cokesbury  is  upon  high  land,  a  Methodist 
village  free  from  barrooms,  gambling  saloons,  or  other  pub- 
lic temptations  to  vice." 


AsBUKY  College. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

ASBURY  COLLEGE,  BALTIMORE,  MARYLAND. 

In  Lis  "Annals  of  Baltimore,"  Kev.  Alfred  Griffith  says: 
"  In  1816  the  Methodists  organized  a  respectable  seminary 
in  Baltimore ;  Rev.  Samuel  K.  Jennings,  M.D.,  was  its  prin- 
cipal. This  is  the  Dr.  Jennings  of  whom  Bishop  Asbury,  in 
the  year  1800,  when  at  Bethel  Academy,  Kentucky,  wrote : 
"  It  was  thought  best,  in  regard  to  Bethel,  to  carry  the  first 
design  of  education  into  operation,  and  that  we  should  em- 
ploy a  man  of  sterling  qualifications  as  president.  Dr.  Jen- 
nings was  thought  of,  talked  of,  written  to."  Though  tilling 
but  a  small  space  in  the  written  history  of  Methodism,  he 
appears  to  have  been  a  man  of  marked  ability  and  of  integ- 
rity, and  at  one  time  he  was  the  only  Methodist  minister 
of  American  birth  who,  within  the  walls  of  a  college,  had 
followed  to  completion  the  regular  curriculum,  and  been 
honored  with  the  baccalaureate  degree.  It  is  said  that  Dr. 
Jennings  was  graduated  in  the  class  of  1785,  at  Rutgers' 
College.  In  1815  Bishop  Asbury,  while  at  the  Virginia 
Conference,  entered  in  his  Journal :  "  Dr.  Jennings  preached 
us  a  great  sermon  on  *  I  am  the  vine,  ye  are  the  branches.' " 

A  charter  was  granted  to  this  school,  called  by  Dr.  Griffith 
a  seminary,  bearing  date  February  10,  1818,  as  Asbury  Col- 
lege, with  nine  trustees,  as  follows :  George  Roberts,  Abner 
Neal,  William  Wilkins,  Philip  Littig,  William  Barker,  Sam- 
uel Harden,  Moses  Hand,  Isaac  A.  Toy,  and  John  Brice — 
all  (says  Rev.  Isaac  P.  Cook,  D.D.)  leading  Baltimore  Meth- 
odists, all  now  (1883)  deceased. 


90  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

The  editors  of  the  "  Methodist  Magazine  "  of  1818,  Eevs. 
Joshua  Soule  and  Tlionias  Mason,  gave  the  following  notice 
of  this,  then,  only  Methodist  college  in  America  : 

It  affords  us  real  satisfaction  to  be  able  to  lay  before  our  readers  the 
following  information  relative  to  the  Asbury  College,  recently  estab- 
lished in  the  city  of  Baltimore.  [Tlie  information  follows  in  several 
pages  of  laudatory  notices  of  the  faculty,  and  of  the  prospects  of  the 
school.]  Many  sincere  friends  of  Methodism  have  long  realized  the 
great  deficiency  in  the  methods  and  means  of  education,  and  have 
regretted  the  want  of  seminaries  under  the  special  direction  and  super- 
intendence of  that  religious  community  to  which  they  are  united.  A 
laudable  zeal  for  the  establishment  of  such  institutions  is  now  prevailing 
in  different  sections  of  the  United  States.  The  Asbury  College  has  prob- 
ably exceeded  in  its  progress,  considering  the  short  time  it  has  been 
established,  any  literary  institution  in  this  country.  The  character  of  the 
president.  Rev.  Samuel  K.  Jennings,  M.D.,  is  too  well  known  to  need 
any  recommendation  from  us.  His  comprehensive  mind,  illuminated  by 
science,  has  long  been  employed  in  designing  a  system  on  which  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  important  branches  of  literature  might  be  obtained  with  the 
greatest  ease  and  facility.  The  plan  and  actual  operations  of  the  Asbury 
College  will  demonstrate  that  these  exertions  have  not  been  ineffectual. 
Professor  Blackburn,  by  long  experience,  has  acquired  the  talent  of 
making  the  mathematics  both  easy  and  delightful ;  an  attainment  as 
rare  as  excellent.  And  Professor  Power,  by  an  unusual  attention  to  the 
department,  has  likewise  introduced  some  very  valuable  improvements 
in  the  method  of  communicating  classical  learning. 

An  additional  item  of  information  to  the  readers  of  the 
Magazine  was,  that  there  were  at  that  date  "  about  one  hun- 
dred and  seventy  students  and  scholars  in  the  seminary,  whose 
progress,  taken  collectively,  surpasses  any  thing  commonly 
exhibited  in  public  schools."  In  the  third  volume  of  his 
''  History  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,"  Dr.  Bangs 
mentions,  in  some  twenty-three  sad  lines,  Asbury  College, 
and  this  Magazine  notice : 


AsBrRT  College.  91 

An  effort  was  made  last  year  to  resuscitate  the  cause  of  education 
among  us.  Dr.  Samuel  K.  Jennings,  aided  by  several  benevolent  and 
public-spirited  individuals  in  the  city  of  Baltimore,  laid  the  foundation 
of  a  literary  institution  denominated  the  Asbury  College,  and  it  went 
into  operation  under  apparently  favorable  auspices,  an  account  of 
which  was  published  in  the  March  number  of  the  ' '  Methodist  Maga- 
zine "  for  this  year.  With  this  account,  however,  the  friends  of  educa- 
tion, who  estimated  things  as  they  are,  were  not  much  gratified,  as  it 
seemed  to  promise  more  than  could  be  nitionally  expected,  and  was 
rather  calculated  to  blazon  forth  the  attainments  of  the  professors  than 
to  enlighten  the  public  by  a  sober  statement  of  facts.  It  continued  for 
a  short  time,  and  then,  greatly  to  the  disappointment  and  mortification 
of  its  friends,  went  down  as  suddenly  as  it  had  come  up,  nnd  Asbury 
College  lives  only  in  the  recollection  of  those  who  rejoiced  over  its  rise 
and  mourned  over  its  fall— a  fatality  which  has  hitherto  attended  all 
attempts  to  establish  literary  institutions  among  us. 

The  "General  Minutes"  for  the  year  1838  contains  an 
obituary  notice  of  that  eminent  man  Rev.  Martin  Ruter. 
Among  the  facts  related  of  him  is  the  statement,  "  In  the 
year  1818  Asbury  College  conferred  on  him  the  degree  of 
Master  of  Arts."  These  items,  found  in  the  "Methodist 
Magazine  "  for  March,  1818,  Dr.  Bangs's  History,  as  quoted, 
and  the  Conference  Minutes,  comprise  all  the  published  in- 
formation the  Church  has  of  Asbury  College. 

The  only  connection  that  Bishop  Asbury  had  with  this 
undertaking  was  tlie  bringing  of  Dr.  Jennings,  a  very  popu- 
lar local  minister,  to  Baltimore.  The  Bishoj)  died  at  or  near 
the  date  of  its  opening  as  a  seminary.  Learning  incident- 
ally, in  March,  1883,  that  there  was  at  least  one  man  living — 
he  has  since  died — who  knew  something  of  Asbury  College, 
I  addressed  to  Rev.  Isaac  P.  Cook,  D.D.,  who  had  for  more 
tlian  fifty  years  held  the  office  of  local  (never  was  an  itin- 
erant) preacher  in  tlie  cit}^  of  Baltimore,  a  number  of  ques- 


92  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

tions  in  regard  to  Asbiiry  College.     From  his  obliging  re- 
sponse I  condense  the  additional  information  given  : 

The  college  was  located  in  a  large  brick  building  on  the  corner  of 
Park  Avenue  and  Franklin  Street,  since  occupied  for  other  purposes. 
A  large  private  female  seminary  was  connected  with  it,  under  the 
charge  of  the  accomplished  daughters  of  Professor  Blackburn.  Bishop 
Asbury  found  Dr.  Jennings  a  teacher  in  the  South,  and  urged  him  to 
come  to  Baltimore.  As  a  preacher,  always  local,  he  attracted  crowds 
nearly  equal  to  Bascom.  His  practice  as  a  doctor  was  immense  for  the 
times.  In  business  he  was  visionary,  always  making  losses,  and  died 
reduced,  but  maintaining  his  integrity.  I  heard  him  preach.  He  was 
a  noble  man. 

The  truth  of  history  requires  one  other  item,  furnished  by 
Dr.  Cook,  of  Dr.  Jennings :  "  In  the  radical  controversy  of 
1828  he  was  expelled  from  our  Church  and  adhered  to  the 
seceders.  On  his  dying  bed  he  regretted  his  severance  from 
our  Church  as  the  mistake  of  his  life."  This  seems  not  to 
have  shaken  the  confidence  of  Dr.  Cook  in,  or  lessened  his  ad- 
miration of,  Dr.  Jennings.  Brief  as  was  its  career,  and  defect- 
ive as  was  its  organization,  Asbury  College  did  some  good 
w^ork,  and  aided,  as  perhaps  all  its  predecessors  have  done, 
in  preparing  the  Church  for  the  new  and  grand  era  of  edu- 
cation then  about  to  dawn.  It  graduated  a  few  in  arts,  some 
in  medicine.  Dr.  Jennings's  specialty ;  others  here  laid  a 
foundation  for  education,  upon  which  they  built  in  other 
schools  or  under  private  tuition.  Dr.  Cook  gave  the  names 
of  quite  a  number  of  the  alumni  of  Asbury  College,  among 
them  three,  who,  at  that  time,  Marcli,  1883,  were  still  living. 
These  were,  Kev.  Dr.  Samuel  Kepler,  aged  seventy-nine,  of 
the  Baltimore  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church,  South,  since  deceased;  Jesse  L.  Warfield,  M.D., 
aged   eighty-two ;   and   Thomas  Littig,  M.D.,  aged   eighty- 


AsBURY  College.  93 

three.  Drs.  Warfield  and  Littig  married  daugliters  of  the 
renowned  Rev.  Thomas  E.  Bond,  M.D.,  D.D.,  the  champion 
Methodist  editor. 

Other  names  furnished  Dr.  Cook  by  these  three  then  liv- 
ing alumni  were  Dr.  J.  Cader,  John  Allemong,  late  veterans 
of  the  Baltimore  Conference;  Rev.  Mr.  Shafer,  who  entered 
the  ministry  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church ;  Josepli 
Neal,  son  of  the  trustee,  Abner  Neal ;  and  Henry  Kepler, 
brother  of  Rev.  Samuel  Kepler,  before  named.  All  these 
were  men  of  prominence  in  their  respective  spheres.  The 
old  Magazine  named  three  of  the  faculty.  Dr.  Cook  gives  the 
names  of  three  others. 

The  full  list,  as  given  by  these  authorities,  consisted  of 
Kev.  Samuel  K.  Jennings,  M.D.,  president,  and  professor  of 
mental  and  moral  science ;  George  Blackburn,  professor  of 
mathematics;  Michael  Power,  professor  of  ancient  languages; 
John  M.  Keogy,  professor  of  English  literature.  Dr.  Hunter, 
who  had  spent  eight  years  in  Paris,  was  teacher  of  the  French 
language.  Dr.  Cook  says,  that  but  few  of  the  professoi-s 
were  Methodists.  One  was  an  avowed  infidel,  one  was  a 
Roman  Catholic. 

How  long  Asbury  College  continued  in  operation  is  not 
certain.  Dr.  Griffitli  says  it  opened  in  1816.  It  was  at  work 
in  1818,  as  during  that  year  it  conferred  on  Rev.  Martin  Ru- 
ter,  afterward  Dr.  Ruter,  tlie  master's  degree.  Dr.  Cook 
said,  "It  died  for  want  of  money  and  of  a  mongrel  religion." 
It  closed  the  Asbury  an  period  of  Methodist  schools. 

It  is  said  that  Cokesbury  College  was  never  chartered  by 
the  Legislature  or  any  court.  This  being  true,  Asbury  Col- 
lege was  the  first  Methodist  college  chartered  in  the  United 
States  and  in  the  world.  Augusta  College,  Kentucky,  was 
the  second.     An  item  of  interest. 


94  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 


PART    II. 


CHAPTER    I. 

THE  WESLEYAN  ACADEMY,  NEWMARKET  AND  WILBRAHAM. 

BY   REV.   DAVID  SHERMAN,  D.D. 

Genuine  revivals  of  religion  have  invariably  tended  to 
quicken  the  intellectual  faculties  and  to  promote  the  diffu- 
sion of  knowledge  through  society,  as  well  as  to  improve  the 
taste  and  purify  the  heart  of  the  people  among  whom  they 
have  prevailed.  The  Lutheran  Reformation  communicated 
an  immense  intellectual  impulse  to  Europe,  and  became  a 
main  aid  in  the  revival  and  diffusion  of  letters.  As  the 
cause  extended  across  the  British  Channel,  the  new  learning 
remained  intimately  associated  with  the  new  faith.  At  a 
later  period,  Puritanism  aroused  the  public  mind,  and  planted 
beside  the  plain  church  the  little  square  school-house,  the 
university  of  the  commonalty.  Again,  Methodism,  the  warm 
wave  of  spiritual  life  which  swept  over  England  and  Amer- 
ica in  the  eighteenth  century,  proved  an  intellectual  stimu- 
lant, penetrating  to  the  very  roots  of  society  and  stirring  to 
activity  the  mental  and  moral  faculties  of  the  masses. 

In  America,  as  well  as  in  England,  were  the  disciples  of 
Wesley  to  become  at  once  an  evangelistic  and  educational 
force,  intent  not  only  upon  the  conversion,  but  upon  the 
intellectual  and  spiritual  edification,  of  the  people.  The  pul- 
pit was  to  be  supplemented  by  the  school ;  the  renewal  of 
the  heart  was  to  be  followed  by  the  cultivation  of  the  intel- 


The  Wesleyan  Academy.  95 

lect,  and  the  harmonious  unfolding  of  the  entire  powers 
of  the  individual.  To  secure  an  end  so  desirable  the  at- 
tempt was  early  made  to  found  literary  institutions.  If 
tlie  first  essays  in  this  direction  were  not  altogether  suc- 
cessful, they  served  to  intensify,  among  our  people,  the  de- 
sire for  education,  and  to  teach  them  how  to  attain  ultimate 
success. 

In  this  educational  movement  among  the  American  Meth- 
odists, the  Wesleyan  Academy  holds  a  conspicuous  and  hon- 
ored place.  It  was  our  first  successful  literary  institution  ; 
and,  in  efficiency  and  usefulness,  it  has  been  excelled  by 
none  of  the  later  foundations.  In  its  history  there  are  three 
marked  stages :  the  first  treats  of  its  founding,  at  Newmarket, 
N.  H.,  1817-1823 ;  the  second,  of  its  removal  to  Wilbraham, 
Mass.,  1824:-1848 ;  and  the  third,  of  its  rebuilding,  1848-1 885. 

I.   THE  FOUNDING,    1817-1823. 

Under  the  lead  of  Jesse  Lee  the  Methodists  entered  New 
England  in  1789.  Access  to  the  hearts  of  the  people  was 
not  easy.  They  were  cool  to  strangers  and  extremely  suspi- 
cious of  false  doctrine  and  its  teachers.  And  the  teachings 
of  the  new  evangelists  were  regarded  by  them  as  rank 
heresy.  In  a  soil  so  hard  and  a  temperature  so  low,  the 
cause  was  slow  in  taking  root.  So  late  as  1815  the  member- 
ship east  of  the  Hudson  was  only  eight  thousand.  In  the 
interior  of  New  England  our  people  were  few.  On  the 
lower  Connecticut,  in  Vermont,  Maine,  and  the  maritime 
tract  extending  from  Rhode  Island  to  Maine,  the  numbers 
were  greater.  On  his  first  invasion  Lee  captured  Lynn  and 
made  a  favorable  impression  on  Boston  and  adjacent  towns. 
At  the  period  here  indicated  some  of  the  ablest  preachers  of 
the  Conference  were  stationed  in  Eastern  Massachusetts  and 


96  ExVKLY  Schools  of  Methodism. 

New  Hampsliire,  and  tliej  were  not  unmindful  of  tlie  defi- 
ciencies and  needs  of  tlie  denomination,  especially  in  educa- 
tional facilities.  TI13  education  of  its  children  had  become 
an  important  consideration.  To  send  them  to  institutions  of 
the  "  standing  order  "  was,  in  most  instances,  to  lose  them  ;  for 
those  schools  were  effective  proselyting  agencies.  The  alter- 
native w^as  either  to  see  the  children  drawn  away  from  the 
faith  for  which  their  parents  contended,  or  to  found  insti- 
tutions of  their  own.  That  they  chose  the  latter  need  not 
surprise  us. 

In  its  inception  the  academy  dates  back  to  1815.  In  the 
latter  part  of  that  year  several  of  the  preachers,  the  real  found- 
ers of  the  institution,  held  a  meeting  for  mutual  counsel  and 
for  the  interchange  of  religious  and  literary  thought  at  the 
house  of  Eev.  John  Brodhead,  in  South  Newmarket,  N.  H., 
where  the  questions  relating  to  the  founding  of  a  literary 
institution  were  recanvassed.  The  difficulties  in  the  way  of 
accomplishing  such  a  work  were  carefully  considered,  and, 
with  the  less  hopeful  of  the  brethren,  had  great  weight ;  but, 
in  the  meeting,  the  sj)irit  of  faith  and  courage  predominated, 
and  a  vote  was  reached  favorable  to  making  the  attempt. 
As  a  location  they  thought  of  no  place  more  suitable  than 
the  one  where  they  were  then  assembled.  The  selection  was 
conditioned  on  the  co-operation  of  the  citizens  of  the  town, 
who  were  to  be  consulted  on  the  subject  by  a  committee 
raised  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  out  the  plan  of  the  preach- 
ers. The  citizens  received  the  proposition  with  favor,  and 
gave  verbal  assurances  of  material  aid  in  furtherance  of  the 
enterprise.  On  condition  that  the  preachers  open  a  school 
and  guarantee  instrnction  for  five  years,  the  citizens  would 
furnish  land  for  a  site  and  contribute  liberally  to  the  funds 
for  the  erection  of  the  academy  building.     The  proposal  was 


The  Wesleyan  Academy.  97 

accepted  by  the  committee,  and  steps  were  taken  to  secure 
the  erection  of  the  academy  edifice. 

Meantime  the  whole  matter  was  brought  before  the  N'ew 
England  Conference  at  its  session  in  Bristol,  H.  I.,  June  22, 
1816.  Though  the  enterprise  was  not  one  of  great  magni- 
tude, the  resources  of  the  Church  were  then  quite  small,  and 
every  available  help  was  needed  to  take  it  on  to  completion. 
The  sympathy  and  aid  of  the  preachers,  as  the  leaders  of  the 
people  and  the  parties  on  whom  dependence  must  be  placed 
for  securing  students,  were  indispensable. 

The  introduction  of  the  matter  to  the  Conference  produced 
a  sensation  By  some  of  the  members  the  movement  was 
deemed  hasty  and  inopportune.  They  were  quite  sure  it 
was  an  elephant  which  would  prove  difficult  to  handle.  By 
others  a  more  hopeful  view  was  taken ;  the  matter  was  not 
only  timely,  but  highly  important  to  the  welfare  of  the 
Church.  The  courage,  foresight,  and  faith  of  the  body 
l)roved  to  be  in  the  ascendant.  The  words  of  discourage- 
ment came  from  the  less  conspicuous  members ;  but  when 
such  men  as  Soule,  Iledding,  Brodhead,  Merrill,  and  Ruter 
spoke,  the  tide  was  completely  turned,  and  a  strong  affirma- 
tive vote  was  secured.  The  advocacy  of  Soule,  whose  influ- 
ence as  a  popular  leader  and  ecclesiastical  statesman  was 
then  predominant  in  the  Conference,  and  Buter,  the  secre- 
tary, the  foremost  scholar  and  the  most  eloquent  preacher  of 
the  body,  was  pronounced  and  influential.  They  declared 
that  the  committee,  in  taking  the  initiative,  had  done  wisely, 
and  ought  to  be  sustained  by  the  Conference  and  the 
Church.  Without  further  hesitancy  they  voted  to  assume 
the  responsibility  of  the  new  enterprise. 

A  committee  of  five — Charles  Virgin,  Caleb  Dustin,  Philip 
Munger,   George  Pickering,  and  John  Brodhead — was  ap- 


98  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

pointed  to  "  make  such  arrangements  with  the  subscribers  at 
Newmarket  as  they  may  think  best  as  agents  of  the  Confer- 
ence." To  this  committee  the  citizens  gave  a  formal  pledge 
to  furnish  a  site  for  the  academy,  and  to  contribute  to  the 
funds  of  the  institution,  while,  in  behalf  of  the  Conference, 
the  committee  bonnd  themselves  to  furnish  instruction  for 
five  years.  Under  tliis  mutual  pledge  the  site  was  selected, 
the  requisite  subscriptions  secured,  and  the  building  was 
erected  at  an  expense  of  $755,  of  which  $261  were  contrib- 
uted by  the  ministers.  Martin  Ruter  gave  $80,  John  Brod- 
head  $55,  and  other  preachers  lesser  sums.  The  building, 
still  standing  and  now  used  as  a  dwelling-house,  was  small 
and  plain,  but  convenient  for  pui-poses  of  instruction.  As 
an  instructor,  the  conimittee  secured  the  services  of  Moses 
White,  a  graduate  of  the  University  of  Yermont,  an  accu- 
rate scholar,  a  superior  teacher,  and  a  fine  Christian  gentle- 
man, who  remained  as  an  instructor  until  the  academy  was 
closed,  in  1823,  doing  very  much  to  promote  its  interests. 
The  first  to  come,  the  last  to  go — one  of  the  few  graduates 
of  the  time  in  the  Church  whose  zeal,  intelligence,  and  serv- 
ices were  invaluable  to  the  cause — he  could  adopt  the  lan- 
guage of  Virgil,  qumque  ipse  miserima  vidi  et  quoritm  pars 
magna  fui.  So  excellent  a  man  and  instructor,  coming  in 
oar  hour  of  need,  will  never  be  forgotten  by  the  Church. 

On  the  first  day  of  September,  1817,  the  school  opened 
with  ten  scholars — five  male  and  five  female.  Among  the 
members  at  this  early  date  we  find  the  names  of  Daniel  D. 
and  John  M.  "B redhead,  and  Edward  T.  Taylor,  the  future 
famous  preacher  of  the  Boston  Bethel.  In  the  course  of  the 
first  term  the  number  rose  to  about  thirty,  and  before  the 
close  of  the  year  to  near  fifty. 

At  the  ensuing  session  of  the  Conference,  held  June,  1818, 


The  Wesleyan  Academy.  99 

the  subject  of  education  came  under  review,  and  the  com- 
mittee to  whom  the  interests  of  the  academy  were  referred 
decided  to  commit  the  wliole  to  the  care  of  trustees.  The 
act  passed  by  the  Legislature  of  New  Hampshire  was 
approved  June  23,  1818,  and  contained,  as  the  first  board  of 
trust,  the  names  of  John  Brodhead,  Daniel  Fillmore,  Amos 
Biimey,  Benjamin  Mathews,  Alfred  Metcalf,  John  Clark, 
Eeuben  Peaselee,  John  Mudge,  and  Joseph  B.  White.  The 
institution  was  fortunate  in  having  so  good  a  board  of  man- 
asrers,  each  member  of  which  was  a  wise  counselor  and  an 
indefatigable  worker. 

"With  the  above  change  in  the  management  came  another 
equally  important  in  the  board  of  instruction.  Martin 
Ruter,  a  man  of  popular  talent  and  easy  manners,  a  star 
preacher  and  an  influential  member  of  the  Conference,  was 
elected  principal  or  "president."  His  advent  marks  a  new 
era  in  the  history  of  the  institution.  Among  our  people  he 
was  a  flaming  advertisement.  A  man  so  widely  known  drew 
attention  to  the  school,  and  enlisted  many  in  its  favor  who 
had  hitherto  been  indifferent.  The  attendance  at  once  rose. 
Eighty  were  present  the  first  day,  many  of  them  from  a  dis- 
tance. In  the  school  itself  he  awakened  fresh  enthusiasm 
and  large  expectations,  especially  among  those  studying  for 
the  ministry.  The  example  of  a  self-made  man  advancing 
to  the  front  rank  of  pulpit  orators,  and  assuming  the  head- 
ship of  our  educational  interests,  suggested  large  possibilities 
to  those  favored  with  better  early  advantages.  Ruter's 
studies  were  varied  in  theology,  history,  languages,  Latin, 
Greek,  Hebrew,  Syriac — what  not  ? — and  science.  He  at- 
tempted to  incorporate  his  large  ideas  into  the  institution. 
The  plan  of  study  was  broad  and  full.  He  looked  to  the 
early  elevation  of  the  academy  into  a  college,  and  actually 


100  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

started  a  branch  academy  in  tlie  neighboring  town  of  Kings- 
ton. But  helpful  as  he  proved  to  be,  Martin  Ruter  was  an 
expensive  piece  of  ornamentation.  If  the  number  of  pupils 
in  attendance  on  the  school  rose,  the  bills  also  accumulated 
against  the  treasury. 

In  1819,  at  the  close  of  Ruter's  first  year,  the  whole  avail- 
able property  of  the  institution,  including  building,  books, 
$1,000  cash  donated  by  Colonel  Binney,  and  a  house  given 
by  John  Mudge,  was  $5,000.  The  deficit  for  the  year  was 
$356  95.  To  meet  this,  and  to  secure  funds  for  the  improve- 
ment of  the  institution.  Rev.  J.  A.  Merrill  was  employed  as 
an  agent,  who  secured  contributions  to  the  amount  of  $1,613. 
This  helped  the  trustees  along  another  stage,  but  was  quite 
insufiicient  to  save  the  institution. 

In  1820  Ruter  resigned,  and  Moses  White  again  came  to 
the  head  and  was  aided  by  his  brother,  Rev.  J.  B.  White,  and 
Henry  Bulfinch,  a  graduate  of  Harvard.  The  decline  from 
this  date  was  rapid  and  inevitable.  Efforts  were  again  made 
to  collect  money,  but  with  small  success.  The  location  w^as 
unfortunate.  Exeter  Academy  was  but  four  miles  away. 
Our  people  and  preachers  had  lost  faith  in  the  new  enter- 
prise. The  ultimate  appeal  was  to  the  Conference  ;  but  the 
Conference  advised  the  removal  to  a  more  favorable  locality. 
The  trustees  hesitated  to  give  up,  but  the  remonstrances  of  a 
committee  sent  by  the  Conference  brought  them  to  a  better 
mind,  and  they  closed  the  school,  December  30,  1823,  with 
the  promise  to  transfer  to  tlie  new  board  whatever  should 
remain  of  the  property  after  paying  the  debts. 

The  attempt  at  Newmarket  was  a  failure ;  it  was  none  the 
less  a  success.  The  place  was  unsuitable.  The  ground  in 
the  eastern  part  of  New  England  was  preoccupied  by  earlier 
institutions.     Newmarket  was  in  an  out-of-the-way  corner. 


The  Wesleyan  Academy.  101 

Above  all,  our  men  were  not  trained  to  manage  educational  in- 
stitutions. But  the  attempt  at  Kewmarket  helped  to  awaken 
an  interest  in  the  cause  of  education  among  our  people,  and 
enabled  some  of  our  young  men  and  women  to  learn  the 
trade  of  education.  It  not  only  gave  a  fresh  impulse  to  the 
cause,  but  also  gave  us  the  lirst  installment  of  educated  men, 
who  went  forth  as  apostles  in  this  new  dispensation  of  popu- 
lar education.  Though  dead,  this  honored  old  institution 
still  continues  to  speak  to  the  generations  of  our  people. 

n.   THE  BEMOVAL,  1824-1848. 

In  the  autumn  of  1823,  while  the  ilame  at  Newmarket  was 
yet  glimmering  in  the  socket,  the  trustees  were  in  search  for 
a  new  location.  The  Rev.  Joseph  A.  Merrill,  one  of  their 
number,  presiding  elder  of  the  New  London  District,  had 
his  attention  called  to  Wilbraham  as  a  place  suitable  for  the 
academy.  He  favored  the  selection,  and  suggested  that  the 
people  of  "Wilbraham  consider  the  matter,  and  that  in  case 
they  would  afford  material  aid,  a  request  be  made  to  the 
board,  who  were  soon  to  hold  an  informal  meeting  for  the 
purpose  of  settling  this  very  question. 

Calvin  Brewer,  who  first  drew  attention  to  Wilbraham  as 
the  new  location  for  the  academy,  circulated  a  subscription 
among  the  chief  citizens,  and,  with  pledges  amounting  to 
about  $1,000,  a  request  was  made  to  the  board,  wliich  met  in 
Boston  during  the  month  of  December,  to  locate  the  school 
there.  In  order  to  be  in  time  for  the  meeting  of  the  trust- 
ees, the  messenger,  the  Rev.  Phineas  Peck,  drove  the  whole 
distance  of  ninety  miles  with  a  gig  in  a  day  and  a  half.  On 
reaching  the  city  he  found  the  trustees  in  session,  and  found 
also  that  they  had  nearly  decided  to  select  Lynn,  where  the 
members  of  the  new  sect  were  quite  numerous;  but,  on  the 


102  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

representations  of  Mr.  Peck,  they  reconsidered,  and  gave  the 
preference  to  Wilbraham. 

On  the  application  of  Kev.  John  Lindsay  to  the  Mas- 
sachusetts Legislature,  an  act  was  approved  February  7, 
1824,  creating  Amos  Binney,  Abel  Bliss,  Abraham  Avery, 
Calvin  Brewer,  Enoch  Mudge,  Wilbur  Fisk,  John  Lindsay, 
Joshua  Crowell,  and  William  Rice  a  body  corporate  under  the 
name  of  the  Trustees  of  the  Wesleyan  Academy,  with  the 
usual  powers,  and  the  right  to  hold  property,  whose  annual 
income  should  not  exceed  $10,000.  On  the  19th  of  the  same 
mouth  the  board  was  organized  by  the  choice  of  Amos  Bin- 
ney as  president  and  Abel  Bliss  secretary.  Further  subscrip- 
tions, amounting  in  all  to  $5,567,  were  obtained  by  Calvin 
Brewer.  The  lot  of  land  where  the  academy  now  stands  was 
donated  by  David  Warriner  and  William  Rice,  and  plans 
were  at  once  secured  and  a  contract  was  made  for  the  erec- 
tion of  an  academy  building,  ''  sixty-five  feet  long  by  thirty- 
five  wide,  two  stories  high,  to  be  divided  into  two  small 
rooms  and  one  large  hall  below,  and  one  large  hall,  forty-five 
by  thirty  five  feet,  and  four  drawing-rooms  above,  with 
flights  of  stairs,  and  a  basement  eight  feet  deep  under  the 
whole  building."  The  building,  costing  about  $1,000,  was 
ready  for  dedication  in  the  autumn  of  the  next  year. 

Meantime  Wilbur  Fisk,  a  young  and  rising  member  of 
the  Conference,  a  fine  scholar,  an  accomplished  gentleman, 
an  eloquent  preacher,  and  the  leader  in  our  educational  work, 
had  been  elected  principal  of  the  new  institution.  On  the 
5th  of  ISTovember,  1825,  the  day  fixed  for  opening  the  school, 
he  delivered  an  address  in  which  he  emphasized  the  value  of 
higher  education,  and  laid  down  the  plan  on  wliich  the  Wes- 
leyan Academy  was  to  be  run.  The  address  was  very  able 
and  was  highly  appreciated  by  both  the  trustees  and  the 


The  Weslkyax  Acadkmy.  103 

Clnircli  at  large.  It  showed  the  possibility  of  uniting  learn- 
ing and  piety,  and  earnestly  advocated  the  establishment  of 
a  manual-labor  department,  a  feature  which  was  adopted,  but 
early  abandoned.  The  plan  of  education  at  Wilbraham,  like 
that  at  Kewmarket,  w^as  very  broad  and  comprehensive.  Tlie 
actual  course  of  study  was  like  that  of  other  New  England 
ae^idemies. 

The  school  opened  with  only  seven  scholars.  The  assist- 
iint,  Nathaniel  Dnnn,  Jr.,  was  sole  teacher  until  the  ensuing 
spring,  Mr.  Fisk  being  detained  by  the  duties  of  his  Ver- 
fuont  district.  Mr.  Dunn,  a  fine  scholar  and  faithful  teacher, 
performed  a  large  amount  of  faithful  service  in  the  insti- 
tution. Under  his  management  the  attendance  steadily 
increased.  From  seven  the  number  swelled  to  fifty,  or 
more.  As  no  board ing-hou3e  had  been  erected,  accommoda- 
tions were  at  first  found  in  the  families  of  the  village,  at  one 
dollar  and  a  quarter  per  week. 

In  the  spring  of  1S2G  the  principal  removed  to  Wilbra- 
ham, and  devoted  his  entire  attention  to  the  school.  He  was, 
from  the  first,  a  man  of  all  service — superintendent,  teach- 
ej",  preacher,  lecturer,  and  collector  of  funds  for  the  im- 
provement of  the  institution.  His  hand  was  every-where. 
Among  other  matters  of  immediate  interest  was  the  erection 
of  a  boarding-house.  Instead  of  building  anew,  the  trustees 
purchased  the  old  Warriner  tavern  stand,  with  the  far.n 
attached,  and  fitted  it  up  for  the  accommodation  of  the 
students  at  cheap  rates.  The  original  cost  of  the  property 
was  $8,500,  and  the  improvements  amounted  to  $l,5nO 
more.  The  house  was  soon  filled  to  overflowing,  and  accom- 
modations had  still  to  be  sought  outside.  This  led  to  further 
enlargement  by  adding  a  northern  annex,  and  a  third  story 
to  the  main  building. 


104:  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

The  first  house-manager  was  Ebenezer  Tliompson,  long 
the  keeper  of  the  village  hotel  at  Concord,  Mass.,  a  fine 
Christian  gentleman,  greatly  liked  by  the  students,  but  ill- 
adjusted  to  the  economical  scale  in  use  at  the  academy.  Mr. 
Thompson  was  succeeded  by  Solomon  Weeks,  a  prudent  and 
excellent  man,  a  skilled  farmer,  and  a  wise  manager  of  the 
house.  The  odor  of  his  virtues  long  remained.  Edward 
Hyde,  who  died  in  the  boarding-house,  a  saintly  man,  Dr. 
Miles  Belden,  and  Davis  Smith,  held  the  position  for  brief 
terms. 

The  discipline  of  the  school  was  mild  and  considerate. 
Fisk  was  among  the  students  as  a  father,  inspiring  the  more 
apathetic,  checking  the  froward,  repressing  the  vicious.  He 
appealed  to  them  as  ladies  and  gentlemen,  and  was  usually 
able  to  bring  their  better  nature  to  the  surface.  The  age  liad 
not,  however,  utterly  abandoned  the  rod.  Incorrigible  sin- 
ners, instead  of  being  turned  away,  were  treated  to  stripes,  few 
or  many,  according  to  the  nature  of  their  crime.  The  dun- 
geon was  a  primitive  institution,  in  the  basement  of  tlie 
academy,  where  the  more  refractory  were  shut  up  in  total 
darkness,  and  fed  on  bread  and  water,  or  subjected  to  long 
periods  of  fasting.  The  dungeon  has  disappeared  ;  but  men 
are  still  living  who  endured  its  trying  penalties,  and  love  to 
tell  the  story  of  their  privations  and  cruel  wrongs.  Many  of 
risk's  corrections  were  private.  In  extreme  cases,  however, 
he  brought  the  culprit  before  the  whole  school,  in  order  that 
others  might  be  w^arned  by  his  example.  Such  instances 
were  usually  impressive  and  salutary,  though  he  was  once 
completely  baffled.  The  lad  had  often  occasioned  him 
trouble,  and  when  the  cup  of  his  iniquity  was  full,  he  was 
told  to  come  the  next  morning  prepared  for  a  birching. 
After  the  usual  morning  devotions  the  culprit  was  called  to 


The  Weslkyan  Acadkmv.  105 

the  floor  and  treated  to  a  homily  on  good  behavior.  Though 
the  other  students  were  serious,  tlie  guilty  one  remained  in 
high  spirits.  Then  came  down  the  birch  over  his  devoted 
shouldere  with  a  hollow,  pasteboard  sound.  His  coat  was 
ordered  off,  when  a  fresh  application  of  the  switch  was  made 
with  little  effect.  Every  body  else  winced,  but  the  lad  re- 
mained calm  and  comfortable.  The  vest  was  ordered  off, 
only  to  find  another  and  another,  and  then  fell  down  a  large 
atlas,  which  had  served  as  an  impenetrable  padding.  The 
whole  school  broke  into  laughter.  Fisk  tried  again,  but  was 
completely  overcome  by  the  repeated  roars  of  laughter,  in 
which  he  was  compelled  to  join.  After  recovering  his  equi- 
librium, he  asked,  "  Why  did  you  fix  yourself  up  in  this 
way?"  "  You  told  me  to  prepare  for  a  flogging,  and  I  did 
so,"  was  the  cool  and  meek  reply,  w^hich  again  brought  the 
house  down.  Without  further  attempt  at  correction,  he  was 
told  to  resume  his  seat,  as  he  had  earned  his  liberty. 

In  Fisk's  time  the  academy  was  affected  by  several  tempo- 
rary crazes,  of  a  financial  sort.  Manual  labor  was  one  of 
them,  in  which  both  the  principal  and  Colonel  Binney  had 
faith.  The  students  were  set  to  gardening,  and,  later,  a 
building  was  erected  for  mechanical  work.  Worst  of  all, 
they  bought  a  store,  and  undertook  to  play  the  merchant. 
In  these  various  attempts  they"  made  nothing;  it  is  much 
to  say  they  lost  nothing.  The  sheet  was  balanced,  and 
tlie  managers  of  the  institution  cured  of  these  various 
maladies. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  features  of  the  school  in  Fisk's 
time  was  the  religious  spirit  which  characterized  it.  Reviv- 
als were  enjoyed  during  each  term,  and  the  meetings  were 
marked  by  constant  interest.  In  1828  was  the  great  revival. 
The   whole  school,  and,  indeed,  the    whole   neighborhood, 


106  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

were  moved.  For  an  entire  week  the  regular  duties  of  the 
school  were  suspended,  and  the  whole  time  was  devoted  to 
religious  services.  Nearly  every  student  was  converted,  and 
among  the  converts  were  some  who  afterward  became  famous 
preachers,  as  Osmon  C.  Baker,  Moses  Hill,  Morris  Hill,  David 
Patten,  and  J.  B.  Merwin.  The  influence  of  this  revival  was 
widely  felt  over  the  Church.  The  report  of  it  was  published 
in  "The  Christian  Advocate,"  and  students  repeated  the 
story  far  and  wide. 

From  the  opening  to  the  close  of  Fisk's  term  the  school 
grew  in  interest  and  numbers.  He  easily  stood  at  the  liead 
of  the  educational  column  in  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 
At  the  opening  he  had  seven  scholars,  and  eleven  hundred 
and  fifty  during  his  term  of  service,  an  average  of  two  hun- 
dred and  twenty-five  a  year.  The  departure  of  the  first  prin- 
cipal formed  a  turning-point  in  the  history  of  the  institution. 

In  1831  Wilbur  Fisk  was  succeeded  by  William  M'Kendree 
Bangs,  a  man  of  many  virtues,  a  fine  scholar,  and  an  accom- 
plished Christian  gentleman,  though,  on  account  of  ill-health, 
poorly  adapted  to  manage  such  an  institution.  After  serving 
only  two  terms  he  resigned  his  position. 

The  Rev.  John  Foster,  a  self-made  man,  a  good  scholar 
and  teacher,  but  a  poor  manager,  succeeded  him  in  1832.  He 
Was  favored  with  an  excellent  corps  of  teachers,  namely, 
William  G.  Mitchell,  an  enthusiast  in  natural  science  ;  Edward 
Otheman,  an  accurate  scholar  and  faithful  teacher;  Sabura 
S.  Stocking,  a  brilliant  scholar  ;  William  Magoun,  an  efiicient 
instructor;  and  S.  P.  Dale,  an  erratic  but  powerful  genius. 
Though  much  good  work  was  done  under  Foster,  the  school 
was  in  a  chronic  condition  of  unrest,  growing  in  part  out  of 
his  poor  management,  and  in  part  from  the  opposition  of  the 
steward,  John  W.  Hardy.     In  the  summer  of  1834  the  dis- 


The  Wesley  an  Academy.  107 

satisfaction  broke  into  open  revolt,  resulting  in  tlie  resig- 
nation of  the  principal. 

From  1S34:  to  18.^1  David  Patten  was  principal.  He  was, 
in  marked  contrast  with  his  predecessor,  a  man  of  gentleness, 
prudence,  one  of  the  Academy's  own  sons,  who  was  greatly  be- 
loved, and  reigned  in  great  peace  and  prosperity.  Although 
not  twenty-four  when  he  began,  he  bore  himself  with  the 
gravity  and  equipoise  of  middle  life.  As  associates  in  teach- 
ing he  had  B.  I.  Diefendorf  in  languages,  Harvey  B.  Lane  in 
mathematics,  John  Roper  in  natural  science,  and  William  H. 
Bussell  in  the  modern  languages ;  Minor  Raymond  taught  in 
the  English  branches.  The  chair  of  the  preceptress  was  occu- 
pied in  succession  by  Catherine  Hyde,  Miranda  Nash,  Susan 
Allen,  and  Hannah  Thompson,  the  last  a  daughter  of  the 
first  steward,  an  elegant  scholar,  and  a  young  lady  of  genius, 
who  left  a  decided  impression  on  the  pupils  who  came  un- 
der her  instruction.  John  W.  Hardy  and  William  Healy 
were  stewards. 

In  1838  a  ladies'  boarding-house  was  erected,  east  of  the 
street,  at  an  expense  of  $3,808  43.  The  spiritual  interest 
remained  good,  revivals  occurring  nearly  every  term.  The 
school  had  declined  in  numbers  under  Bangs  and  Foster,  hut 
it  rallied  under  Patten,  and  rose  in  1838  to  nine  hundred  and 
thirty-four  by  aggregate  of  terms.  This  was  the  culmination. 
From  this  point  a  decline  set  in  which  extended  down  into 
the  administration  of  Adams.  The  decline  was  occasioned 
by  the  new  school  laws  of  Massachusetts,  and  the  erection  of 
rival  institutions.  The  antislavery  battle  then  in  progress 
was  participated  in  by  the  teachers  and  students. 

The  administration  of  the  Rev.  Charles  Adams  extended 
over  the  period  from  1841  to  1845.  He  was  at  that  time 
full  of   vigor,  young,  active,  energetic,  and    positive.     He 


lOS  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

loved  work,  and  did  a  large  amount  of  teaching  and  lect- 
uring. Early  and  late  lie  was  at  it,  serving  for  two  of  his 
years  as  stationed  preacher,  as  well  as  principal.  The  de- 
cline which  began  under  Patten  continued  under  Adams. 
During  Patten's  last  year  there  were  but  three  hundred  and 
twenty-eight  students;  under  Adams  the  number  rose  the 
first  year  to  three  hundred  and  sixty-one,  and  tlien  fell  to 
three  hundred  and  six,  the  lowest  point.  The  tide  turned  in 
1844,  the  number  being  three  hundred  and  twenty.  From 
that  point  the  ascent  was  steady  and  continuous.  As  assist- 
ants Adams  had  Bussell,  Roper,  I.  T.  Goodnow,  who  began 
under  Patten,  Robert  Allyn,  fresh  from  the  Wesley  an  Uni- 
versity, and  John  H.  Twombly.  From  the  trustee  board, 
John  Lindsay,  Abel  Bliss,  Abraham  Avery,  William  Smith, 
and  John  W.  Hardy  retired.  John  M.  Merrick,  Minor  Ray- 
mond, Phineas  Crandall,  Charles  Adams,  R.  R.  Wright,  and 
Amos  Binney  filled  the  vacancies.  The  rehgious  interest 
during  this  period  was  well  sustained.  In  1842  there  was 
a  revival  of  marked  power,  in  which  Reuben  H.  Loomis  was 
a  chief  actor,  and  Daniel  Steele  and  James  M.  Wooster  were 
converts. 

The  term  of  Robert  Allyn  extended  from  1845  to 
1848.  Bussell  and  Goodnow  continued  as  teachers ;  Orange 
Judd,  Samuel  F.  Beach,  and  Oliver  Marcy  were  new  re- 
cruits. Isabella  II.  Hill  was  preceptress,  and  James  Howe 
and  Alexander  P.  Lane  were  stewards.  Under  Mr.  Allyn's 
supervision  the  school  enjoyed  a  gojd  degree  of  prosperity. 
The  number  of  students  in  attendance  steadily  increased. 
Tlie  three  liundred  and  forty-three  of  Adams's  last  year  rose 
to  three  hundred  and  eighty- t\vo  in  Allyn's  first  year,  three 
hundred  and  eighty-four  in  his  second,  and  four  hundred  and 
sixty-two  in  his  third,  marking  a  very  decided  turn  in  the  tide. 


The  Wesley  an  Academy.  109 

Special  instruction  was  given,  fall  and  spring,  to  those  design- 
ing to  teach,  including  lectures  on  the  method  of  teaching 
and  the  qualifications  of  the  teacher.  The  religions  condition 
of  the  school  was  good ;  Sabbath  observance  was  enjoined ; 
and  much  attention  was  given  to  biblical  instruction  in  the 
Sunday-school. 

At  the  close  of  the  summer  term  of  1848  a  grand  alumni 
gathering  was  held  in  the  grove  north  of  the  academy. 
Many  former  students  were  present ;  memories  of  old  days 
were  revived.  Annis  Merrill,  Esq.,  of  San  Francisco,  deliv- 
ered an  extended  and  able  historical  address.  The  occasion 
was  one  of  rare  interest,  rounding  off  grandly  the  second 
period  in  the  history  of  this  noble  and  cherished  institution. 
With  the  increase  of  numbers,  the  principal  had  organized  a 
graduate  course,  and  made  arrangements  for  paying  the  debt 
and  improving  the  property.  But  when  just  entering  upon 
these  schemes  he  resigned  his  position. 

in.   THE  EEBUILDING,  1848-1885. 

The  successor  of  Kobert  Allyn  was  the  Rev.  Minor 
llaymond,  D.D.,  a  man  of  marked  ability,  a  clear  and  logical 
thinker,  a  mighty  preacher,  a  born  educator,  and  a  man  ex- 
erting an  extensive  influence  among  the  preachers  and  lay- 
men of  the  Church.  His  election  marks  an  era  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  institution.  Old  things  passed  away,  all  be- 
came new.  Difficulties,  which  at  first  appeared  insuper- 
able, vanished  at  the  touch  of  one  able  to  command  the 
situation,  and  the  institution,  assuming  larger  proportions, 
came  to  hold  a  higher  place  in  the  esteem  of  the  public. 
During  the  term  of  his  administration — 1848-1864 — every 
thing  was  made  new — buildings,  faculty,  trustees,  attend- 
ance, prices. 


110  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Minor  Kay  men  d  was  born,  1811,  in  Kensselaerville,  N.  Y., 
and  early  joined  tlie  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  The  ac- 
count of  the  ^reat  revival  at  the  Wesleyan  Academy  in  1828, 
published  in  "  The  Christian  Advocate,"  led  him  to  Wilbra- 
liam,  where  he  remained,  as  student  and  teacher,  until  1842. 
Here,  again,  after  six  years  in  the  pastorate,  he  became  prin- 
cipal. 

On  entering  upon  his  duties  Raymond  found  a  debt  of 
over  $8,000,  incurred  by  building  the  ladies'  boarding-house, 
interest,  and  repairs.  The  pi-operty  donated  by  Colonel 
Binney,  located  at  East  Cambridge,  was  sold  for  $5,000, 
leaving  still  a  debt  of  more  than  $3,000.  In  spite  of  this  he 
determined  to  improve  the  buildings  already  there,  and  to 
erect  others. 

In  1849  the  trustees  took  steps  toward  building  "  Fisk 
Hall."  The  principal  was  authorized  to  raise  money  for  the 
purpose,  and  in  March,  1851,  pledges  had  been  secured  to 
the  amount  of  $4,100.  The  treasurer,  at  the  same  time, 
reported  a  balance  in  favor  of  the  institution  of  $1,441  85,  a 
more  favorable  showing  than  for  twenty  years.  With  such 
encouragement  they  proceeded  to  erect  a  substantial  brick 
building,  two  stories,  with  an  elevated  basement,  containing 
an  ample  assembly  room,  rooms  for  the  two  literary  societies 
of  the  gentlemen,  the  fine  arts,  and  recitation.  The  Hall, 
erected  at  a  cost  of  $8,000,  is  a  fine  monument  to  the 
memory  of  the  first  principal  at  Wilbraham.  The  open- 
ing address  was  made  by  Eev.  Joseph  Cummings,  D.D. 
The  old  academy  was  regarnished,  and  the  ladies'  boarding- 
house  was  removed,  and  joined  as  an  L  to  the  gentlemen's 
boarding-house.  In  1854  the  laboratory  was  replaced  by  an 
elegant  brick  structure  called,  in  honor  of  an  early  trustee 
and  benefactor,  '*  Binney  Hall."     This  cost  $8,000.    In  1856 


The  Wesley  an  Academy.  Ill 

the  new  principal's  Louse  was  built,  at  a  cost  of  $4,000 — paid 
by  Isaac  Kich.  But  this  was  a  year  of  reverses,  as  well  as  of 
successes.  On  January  4  the  newly  titted  boarding-house 
was  destroyed  by  fire,  causing  a  loss  of  $12,000,  the  insurance 
being  only  $4,000  to  meet  it.  This  was  a  heavy  blow ;  but 
the  principal  did  not  stop  to  mourn  over  the  loss.  He 
at  once  prepared  to  rebuild  on  a  larger  scale,  and  in  im- 
proved style.  On  the  first  day  of  August  there  began  to 
arise  from  the  ashes  a  new  brick  edifice,  two  hundred  and 
forty  by  thirty-eight  feet,  with  an  L  in  the  rear,  one  hundred 
and  forty  by  thirty-eight  feet,  three  and  four  stories  high, 
at  a  cost  of  $50,000.  On  the  9th  of  September  this  magnifi- 
cent building  was  destroyed  by  the  torch  of  an  incendiary. 

To  rebuild  seemed  impossible;  not  to  rebuild  was  ruin; 
how  to  rebuild  was  a  problem.  But  a  new  and  larger  house 
was  erected,  at  a  cost  of  $75,000.  To  meet  this  heavy  expense 
the  State  granted,  in  all,  $36,000 ;  Isaac  Rich  contributed 
$40,000,  and  Lee  Claflin  $10,000.  The  new  boarding-house 
was  opened  in  1861,  with  a  debt  of  $20,000. 

Dr.  Raymond  was  aided  by  an  able  corps  of  teachers. 
Bussell  and  Oliver  Marcy  ran  through  most  of  the  period. 
Fales  H.  Newhall,  George  M.  Steele,  Oliver  S.  Howe, 
Henry  W.  "Warren,  S.  F.  Chester,  E.  B.  Otheman,  Emerson 
Warner,  A.  D.  Vail,  N.  Fellows,  C.  N.  Stowers,  and  T.  H. 
Kimpton  came  in  later.  The  attendance  was  very  large,  ris- 
ing, during  some  terms,  above  any  point  reached  under  Pat- 
ten. In  1864  Dr.  Raymond  resigned ;  but  Wilbraham,  the 
place  of  his  early  attachment,  the  scene  of  his  grandest  labors 
and  triumphs,  will  retain,  in  its  group  of  noble  educational 
buildings,  his  enduring  monument. 

Rev.  Edward  Cooke,  D.D.,  was  principal  from  1864  to 
1874.     The  attendance  under  him  remained  very  large.     He 


112  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

enjoyed  the  advantage  of  the  impetus  from  tlie  administra- 
tion of  his  predecessor.  It  was,  too,  the  flush  period  after  the 
war.  He  w^as  himself  also  very  active  in  his  work.  The 
courses  of  study  organized  by  Dr.  Eaymond  were  improved 
and  extended  under  Dr.  Cooke,  and  special  studies  were  in- 
troduced. The  old  church  was  purchased  and  utilized  as  a 
music  hall  and  gymnasium,  and  the  new  stone  church  was 
built  by  aid  of  the  trustees  and  the  New  England  Confer- 
ence. The  library  was  enlarged  by  the  purchase  of  the 
Chester  Field  collection,  at  a  cost  of  $1,500  ;  the  income  of 
this  administration  was  large ;  the  outgoes  were  also  large ; 
and  as  a  result  the  debt  rose  from  $20,000  to  $30,000. 

Rev.  [N^athaniel  Fellows,  a  former  teacher,  was  principal 
from  1874  to  1879.  It  was  the  period  of  the  hard  times, 
and  of  reaction  from  great  prosperity.  The  academy  was 
no  longer  advertised  by  its  misfortunes  or  successes,  and  so 
early  fell  out  of  sight.  The  attendance  declined.  But,  in 
spite  of  these  disadvantages,  the  financial  resources  were 
handled  with  such  prudence  and  tact  that,  besides  improve- 
ments in  the  property,  the  debt  was  reduced  several  thou- 
sand dollars.  The  principal  liad  the  entire  confidence  of  the 
trustees  and  of  the  Conference.  A  healthy  and  harmonious 
state  of  affairs  prevailed,  and  he  left  with  the  regrets  of 
trustees,  teachers,  and  students. 

Rev.  George  M.  Steele,  D.D.,  has  been  principal  from 
1879  to  1885.  A  man  of  ripe  judgment,  an  experienced 
educator,  a  safe  and  wise  business  manager,  and  a  judicious 
disciplinarian;  with  tact  to  deal  with  students,  he  has  dis- 
played the  instinct  and  capacity  for  school  administration. 
He  at  once  improved  the  boards  of  instruction  and  trust  by 
infusing  into  them  fresh  blood.  Rev.  L.  Crowell,  D.D.,  was 
employed  to  act  as  financial  agent.     Money  has  been  raised 


The  Wesleyan  Academy.  113 

to  liquidate  the  debt,  and  an  endowment  has  been  begun. 
These  efforts  have  done  much  to  bring  the  academy  again  to 
the  notice  of  our  people,  and  thus  to  secure  students  in 
larger  numbers.  The  attendance  in  1884  was  four  hundred 
and  eleven,  an  average  of  two  hundred  and  thirty-eight  each 
terra.  The  institution  now  more  than  meets  expenses,  and 
will  be  able  in  due  time  to  afford  some  aid  to  indigent  stu- 
dents by  way  of  scholarships.  On  the  whole,  the  outlook  for 
the  future  is  highly  encoui-aging.  This  old  and  honored 
school  is  to  become  larger  and  more  influential  than  for 
many  years  under  the  inspiration  and  efforts  of  the  present 
principaL 


114:  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTER  II. 

AUGUSTA    COLLEGE,     KENTUCKY. 

BY   REV.   DANIEL  STEVENSON,   D.D. 

In  1798  the  citizens  of  Bracken  County,  Ky.,  secured 
from  the  State  a  grant  of  six  thousand  acres  of  land  to 
enable  them  to  establish  Bracken  Academy  at  the  town  of 
Augusta,  on  the  Ohio  Eiver,  at  that  time  the  county  seat 
of  Bracken  County.  Tlit^- trustees  wisely  held  this  land  until 
prices  had  so  enhanced  ats  to  provide  a  considerable  fund, 
which  was  employed  in  bringing  into  existence  the  first  in- 
stitution of  learning  under  Methodist  control  that  accom- 
plished the  work  as  well  as  bore  the  name  of  a  college. 

At  the  session  of  the  Ohio  Conference,  held  in  Septem- 
ber, 1821,  Rev.  John  Collins  and  Rev.  Martin  Ruter  were 
appointed  commissioners  to  attend  the  Kentucky  Confer- 
ence, which  was  to  be  held  a  little  later  in  the  month,  and 
propose  that  the  two  Conferences  *'  unite  in  the  estaljlish- 
raent  of  a  college."  The  subject  had  evidently  been  consid- 
ered previously  by  the  members  of  the  Kentucky  Conference. 
They  responded  that  the  establishment  of  such  an  institution 
within  their  own  bounds  was  "  expedient  and  necessary,"  and 
that  the  place  where  there  was  "  a  prospect  of  the  most  ample 
funds  for  the  purpose  "  was  Augusta.  Rev.  Geo.  C.  Light  and 
Rev.  Marcus  Lindsey  were  appointed  to  confer  with  the  com- 
missioners of  the  Ohio  Conference  and  to  take  such  measures 
in  favor  of  the  contemplated  establishment  as  they  might  think 
expedient,  without  involving  themselves  or  the  Conference 
in  expense.     On  the  15th  day  of  the  following  December 


Augusta  College.  115 

the  commissioners  of  tlie  two  Conferences  met  at  Augusta, 
and,  after  an  interchange  of  views  between  themselves  and  the 
trustees  of  Bracken  Academy,  expressed  themselves  willing 
to  make  Augusta  the  seat  of  the  college,  provided  "  assistance 
could  be  obtained  from  the  trustees  of  tlie  academy  and  the 
citizens  in  building  a  college  edifice,  and  giving  the  institu- 
tion a  start." 

The  trustees  of  the  academy  adopted  a  resolution,  in  which, 
after  declaring  that  they  were  of  opinion  that  the  funds  with 
which  they  had  been  intrusted  could  not  be  better  appropri- 
ated than  in  assisting  in  the  establishment  of  an  institution 
of  the  kind  proposed,  they  agreed  that  the  proceeds  of  the 
Bracken  Academy  Fund  should  be  appropriated  to  the  use 
of  such  an  institution,  and  paid  over  to  the  trustees  annu- 
ally, and  that  all  the  original  fund,  over  and  above  the 
sum  of  $10,000  of  active  capital,  should  be  paid  over  to  the 
said  university,  provided  that  the  trustees  of  the  academy 
should  be  authorized  to  appoint  three  of  their  own  body  to  be 
trustees  of  the  university,  in  conjunction  with  the  trustees 
who  should  be  appointed  by  the  Church,  and  that  the  annual 
support  thus  pledged  should  be  appropriated  to  sustain  a  chair 
for  the  teaching  "  of  the  Latin,  Greek,  and  English  branches 
of  education."  Sometime  in  the  year  1822,  probably  about 
the  middle,  a  preparatory  classical  school  was  opened  in  the 
academy  buiying,  under  the  principalship  of  Rev.  John  P. 
Finley.  The  college  was  not  yet  organized,  but  it  became 
necessiiry  for  the  Conferences  to  have  the  Latin  and  Greek 
languages,  as  well  as  the  English  branches,  taught,  that  the 
proceeds  of  the  Bracken  Academy  fund  of  $10,000  might  be 
appropriated  to  the  use  of  the  school. 

John  P.  Finley  was  the  prospective  professor  of  languages. 
He  was  a  native  of  North  Carolina,  and  a  brother  of  the 


116  Early  Schools  of  Methodism.  ' 

widely-known  and  greatly  honored  James  B.  Finley,  long  a 
leading  member  of  the  Oliio  Conference.  They  were  both 
educated  by  their  father,  an  almnnus  of  Princeton  College, 
and  for  many  years  a  minister  in  the  Presbyterian  Church. 
In  1808  his  sons  united  with  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church.  The  father  soon  after  changed  his  Church  rela- 
tions, and,  to  the  close  of  his  life,  was  a  minister  of  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  John  P.  Finley  was  licensed 
to  preach  in  1810.  He  taught  in  various  places  in  Ohio  be- 
fore he  was  called  to  Augusta  College.  In  September,  1822, 
he  was  admitted  on  trial  into  the  Kentucky  Conference,  and 
was  appointed  to  Augusta  College. 

In  December,  1822,  the  institution  received  a  charter  from 
the  Legislature  of  Kentucky,  with  full  authority  to  confer 
degrees,  the  only  Methodist  college  then  in  existence  with 
such  authority. 

The  most  active  and  influential  man  in  securing  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  college  was  Captain  James  Armstrong,  a  lay 
member  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  at  Augusta, 
who  had,  for  a  number  of  years,  been  a  trustee  of  Bracken 
Academy,  and  who,  at  the  time  of  the  contract  between  the 
academy  and  the  Conference  commissioners,  was  its  treas- 
urer. He  had  united  with  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church 
when  it  had  in  Augusta  but  three  members.  The  lirst 
Methodist  preaching  was  in  the  Presbyteiiian  church. 
One  Sunday  morning,  when  the  Methodist  preacher  ap- 
proached the  pulpit,  he  found  it  occupied  by  the  Presbyte- 
rian pastor,  who  informed  him  that  he  himself  expected  to 
preach  in  the  church  at  that  hour.  Captain  Armstrong 
thereupon  arose  and  said :  "  We  will  retire  to  the  court- 
house." The  Methodist  preacher  then  announced  that  he 
would  preach  in  the  court-house,  and  invited  all  who  wished 


Augusta  College.  117 

to  hear  him,  to  retire  to  that  place.  Nearly  all  the  congrega- 
tion left  the  church  and  went  to  the  court-house.  The  next 
day  Captain  Armstrong  invited  the  members  and  friends  of 
the  Methodist  Church  to  meet  him  at  a  certain  place ;  and 
there,  after  measuring  off  a  lot  from  his  own  ground,  he 
began  the  erection  of  a  Methodist  Episcopal  church.  Yery 
soon  the  building  was  completed  and  was  ready  for  occupan- 
cy. Captain  Armstrong  had  borne  the  entire  expense,  except 
the  cost  of  some  tin- work,  which  a  Mr.  Pattison,  who  was  a 
tinner  and  a  Methodist,  had  insisted  on  doing  without  com- 
pensation. 

The  old  house  stands  there  now,  on  the  bank  of  the  river, 
with  a  stone  slab  on  the  front  wall  containing  the  inscription, 
"  Erected  in  1819."  It  has  passed  through  four  floods.  The 
flood  of  1884  rendered  it  unsuitable  for  further  use,  and  the 
walls  of  a  new  church  edifice  have  just  been  completed  in  a 
higher  part  of  the  town. 

As  soon  as  the  charter  for  tlie  college  was  granted  by  the 
Legislature,  Captain  Armstrong  undertook,  with  the  assist- 
ance of  a  few  friends,  the  erection  of  the  college  edifice  on 
a  lot  of  his  own  ;  and,  on  the  4tli  of  October,  1823,  the  build- 
ing being  completed,  he  conveyed  the  property  to  the  trust- 
ees of  Augusta  College.  The  building  was  eighty  by  forty- 
two  feet.  On  the  first  floor  was  a  chapel,  forty  by  thirty 
feet,  with  two  recitation  rooms,  thirty  by  eighteen  feet.  On 
the  second  floor  were  six  rooms.  The  third  story  was  divided 
into  seven  rooms. 

Captain  Armstrong  lived  long  enough  to  see  the  building 
occupied  by  the  preparatory  school,  but  not  longenonsjh  to  see 
the  college  in  full  operation.  He  died  in  August,  1824,  and 
was  buried  in  the  rear  of  the  church  wjiich  he  had  erected. 

Mr.  Finley  continued  his  labore  at  the  college  until  they 


118  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

were  terminated  by  his  death,  in  May,  1825.  His  remains 
rest  in  the  rear  of  the  old  church. 

In  September  following,  Kev.  Joseph  S.  Tomlinson,  A.B., 
who  had  just  graduated  from  Transylvania  University,  was 
appointed  professor  of  mathematics  and  natural  philosophy. 
During  the  next  month  Eev.  John  P.  Durbin,  A.M.,  was 
elected  to  the  chair  of  Latin  and  Greek. 

Professor  Tomlinson's  training  had  been  by  one  of  the 
most  pious  and  cultivated  of  mothers.  In  his  twelfth  year 
he  joined  the  Church,  at  sixteen  was  licensed  to  exhort,  and 
at  eighteen  to  preach.  He  learned  the  trade  of  a  saddler, 
and  followed  it  until  he  entered  college. 

Upon  the  recommendation  of  the  trustees  of  Transylvania 
University,  young  men  could  be  admitted  free  of  tuition  as 
beneficiaries  of  the  Morrison  Fund.  The  Hon.  Henry  Clay 
was  the  administrator  of  this  fund,  and  a  trustee  of  the  uni- 
versity. It  so  occurred  that  on  a  Saturday  night  young 
Tomlinson  was  to  preach  at  a  quarterly  meeting  in  Lexington. 
Mr.  Clay  was  invited  by  Eev.  Henry  M'Daniel  to  hear  the 
sermon.  He  did  so ;  and,  after  the  service,  invited  the  young 
minister  to  visit  him  at  his  home.  Mr.  Tomlinson  accepted 
the  invitation,  and  Mr.  Clay  requested  the  privilege  of  pre- 
senting his  name  to  the  trustees  for  admission  to  the  univer- 
sity, under  the  provision  of  the  Morrison  Fund.  At  the 
opening  of  the  next  term  Mr.  Tomlinson  entered  the  univer- 
sity, where  he  at  once  took  high  rank  as  a  young  man  of  fine 
natural  ability  and  of  remarkable  purity  of  life  and  charac- 
ter. While  he  was  still  a  student  at  Lexington,  General 
La  Fayette  visited  the  university.  Young  Tomlinson  was  se- 
lected to  make  the  address  of  welcome  on  the  part  of  the  stu- 
dents. He  was  graduated  with  high  honor  in  1825.  Immedi- 
ately after  his  graduation  he  was  elected  to  a  professorship  in 


Augusta  College.  110 

Augusta  College,  and  was  very  soon  admitted  on  trial  into 
the  Kentucky  Conference. 

John  P.  Dnrbin  was  born  in  Bourbon  County,  Ky.,  in  the 
year  ISOO.  At  tlie  age  of  fourteen  he  was  apprenticed  to  a 
cabinet-maker.  He  was  converted  in  1818,  and  soon  after  was 
licensed  to  preach  and  was  admitted  into  the  Conference.  In 
the  autumn  of  1821  he  was  stationed  at  Hamilton,  Ohio. 
While  here  he  availed  himself  of  the  advantages  of  Miami 
University,  at  Oxford.  He  spent  the  week  at  Oxford,  in  the 
university,  and  on  Friday  afternoons  returned  to  his  pastoral 
charge.  His  removal  to  another  charge,  at  the  end  of  the 
Conference  year,  deprived  him  of  these  advantages  at  Oxford, 
but,  fortunately  for  him,  his  next  appointment  was  to  Cin- 
cinnati. Here  he  was  again  in  the  enjoyment  of  scholarly 
instruction,  in  the  Cincinnati  College,  and,  at  the  end  of  the 
collegiate  year,  he  received  the  honorary  degree  of  A.M. 
In  October  following  he  joined  Professor  Tomlinsou,  at 
Augusta.  They  were  aided  by  Mr.  Ingram,  who  taught  a 
preparatory  school.  There  was  as  yet  no  president  of  the 
college.  It  is  probable  that  Professor  Tomlinson  was  the  tem- 
porary head  of  the  institution,  as  the  professor  of  mathematics 
was  afterward  ex  officio  vice-president  of  the  college. 

In  1827  Eev.  Martin  Ruter,  A.M.,  who  in  1820  had  been 
elected  Book  Agent  to  organize,  at  Cincinnati,  O.,  a  "Western 
branch  of  the  New  York  Methodist  publishing  house,  was 
elected  president  of  the  college,  with  the  understanding  that 
he  should  not  enter  upon  his  duties  until  his  successor  at  the 
Book  Concern  should  be  appointed.  Mr.  Ruter  had  been  a 
prominent  preacher  in  Xew  England.  He  was  born  in  Mas- 
sachusetts, was  converted  at  the  age  of  fifteen,  and  soon  after- 
ward became  a  member  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 
The  next  year  he  was  licensed  to  exhort,  and  in  the  course 


120  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

of  a  few  months,  to  preach.  He  began  his  itinerant  work  in 
Yermont.  During  the  several  years  following  he  labored 
in  Montreal,  Canada ;  New  Hampshire ;  Boston,  Mass. ;  and 
Portland,  Me.  In  1818  he  was  appointed  principal  of  the 
Newmarket  Seminary.  While  at  this  institution  he  received 
from  the  short-lived  Asbury  College  the  degree  of  A.M. 
"While  Book  Agent  at  Cincinnati,  Transylvania  University 
conferred  upon  him  the  degree  of  D.D.  It  is  believed  that 
he  was  the  first  minister  in  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church 
upon  whom  tliis  degree  was  conferred. 

At  the  same  time  that  Dr.  Ruter  was  elected  president, 
Frederick  A.  M.  Davis,  M.D.,  was  elected  professor  of  chem- 
istry and  botany.  He  was  a  resident  physician  of  Augusta, 
and  was  of  more  than  ordinary  ability  in  his  profession.  The 
full  faculty  now  consisted  of  Eev.  Martin  Ruter,  D.D.,  presi- 
dent, and  professor  of  oriental  languages  and  belles-lettres ; 
Rev.  Joseph  S.  Tomlinson,  A.B.,  professor  of  mathematics 
and  natural  philosophy;  Rev.  John  P.  Durbin,  A.M.,  of 
ancient  languages  and  Grecian  and  Roman  antiquities ; 
F.  A.  M.  Davis,  M.D.,  of  chemistry  and  botany ;  Arnold 
Truesdale,  preceptor  of  the  academic  department ;  Thomas 
H.  Lynch,  a  student,  assistant  in  the  academic  department; 
and  John  Yincent,  teacher  of  the  primary  school. 

In  the  board  of  trustees,  as  then  organized,  consisting  of 
twenty-three  members,  were  John  Armstrong,  president, 
and  Johnson  Armstrong,  treasurer,  both  of  Maysville,  Ky. ; 
Bishop  Joshua  Soule,  D.D.,  Rev.  O.  M.  Spencer,  Rev.  John 
Meek,  Rev.  John  Collins,  Rev.  George  C.  Light,  and  Rev. 
Enos  Woodward. 

The  course  of  study  was  full  and  complete,  embracing 
every  thing  required  by  the  best  American  colleges  of  that 
day.    At  the  close  of  the  college  year,  1831,  Professor  Durbin 


Augusta  College.  121 

tendered  his  resignation.  In  his  travels  to  advance  the  inter- 
ests of  the  college  and  to  increase  its  funds,  he  had  become 
widely  known  as  a  man  of  great  personal  worth  and  as  one 
of  the  most  effective  pulpit  orators  in  America.  Without  his 
knowledge,  the  United  States  Senate  elected  him  its  chap- 
lain. In  1832  he  was  tendered  a  professoi*ship  in  the  Weslejan 
University,  Connecticut,  and  soon  after  was  elected,  by  the 
General  Conference,  editor  of  "The  Christian  Advocate." 
He  had  scarcely  been  installed  in  his  new  position  when  he 
was  elected  president  of  Dickinson  College.  About  this 
time  he  was  honored  with  the  title  of  D.D.  Before  taking 
final  leave  of  Dr.  Durbin,  who  rose  to  such  eminence  in 
after  years  as  preacher,  college  president,  traveler,  writer, 
and  Missionary  Secretary,  his  lively  interest  in  the  spiritual 
good  of  the  pupils  of  Augusta  College  should  be  referred 
to.  All  will  be  interested  in  learning  that  revivals,  so  com- 
mon in  Methodist  schools  in  later  years,  were  enjoyed  in  this 
early  Methodist  college. 

Under  date  of  January,  1828,  Dr.  Durbin  wrote  to  "The 
(christian  Advocate  :  "  "  This  has  been  one  of  the  best  days 
I  have  ever  seen.  We  have  a  most  glorious  revival.  What 
will  be  the  fruits  no  man  can  yet  tell.  Twenty-two  joined 
this  morning,  many  of  them  young  men  and  students  of 
Augusta  College.  I  think  the  revival  should  be  considered  as 
among  the  students  principally.  It  commenced  with  them. 
It  would  do  you  good  to  witness  the  soundness  of  their  con- 
version, and  the  ardor  of  their  triumph.  Onr  college  is 
prosperous.  We  have  about  one  hundred  students.  I  had 
long  believed  that  a  college  could  be  made  not  only  the 
nursery  of  learning,  but  of  morals  and  religion.  1  am  con- 
vinced of  it  more  and  more  every  day.     I  rejoice  that  we 

have  in  the  West  one  regulai'  college  where  our  youth  may 
6 


122  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

be  educated,  and  neither  their  morals  nor  their  principles 
corrupted.  And  yet  we  do  not  teach  them  religion,  other- 
wise than  we  teach  other  men,  namely,  by  preaching  to 
them,  and  endeavoring  to  walk  uprightly  before  them.  I 
am  clearly  convinced  that  our  youth  should  not  be  taught  by 
any  man  who  is  not  decidedly  pious." 

The  next  morning  he  added  a  postscript,  as  follows :  "  I 
closed  my  letter  last  night  at  nine  o'clock.  I  then  returned 
to  the  church,  and  my  eyes  never  beheld  such  a  scene.  The 
house  was  full  of  mourners.  It  is  not  yet  known  how  many 
were  converted.  There  are  but  few  students  of  Augusta 
College  but  that  are  either  converted  or  serious." 

Dr.  Durbin  was  succeeded,  as  professor  of  languages,  by 
Kev.  B.  H.  M'Cown,  A.M.  At  the  same  time  Rev.  Henry  B. 
Bascom,  A.M.,  was  elected  professor  of  moral  science.  Pro- 
fessor M'Cown  was  born  in  Bardstown,  Ky.,  in  1806.  The 
first  Methodist  that  he  ever  heard  preach  was  H.  B.  Bascom. 
Professor  M'Cown  w^as  educated  at  St.  Joseph's  College,  a 
Roman  Catholic  institution,  and  was  the  first  person  w^ho 
joined  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  at  Bardstown.  A  class 
was  organized  there  in  1825,  and  he  was  soon  after  licensed 
to  exhort,  then  to  preach,  and,  in  1827,  was  admitted  on  trial 
into  the  Kentucky  Conference.  Professor  Bascom  Avas  a  na- 
tive of  the  State  of  New  York.  At  the  age  of  fifteen  he  united 
with  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  At  seventeen  he  was 
licensed  to  preach,  and  admitted  on  trial  into  an  Annual  Con- 
ference. He  soon  began  to  attract  great  attention  by  his  elo- 
quence. In  1818  he  was  appointed  to  Louisville,  Ky.  In 
1823  he  was  chosen  chaplain  in  Congress,  througli  the  influ- 
ence of  his  life-long  friend,  Hon.  Henry  Clay.  In  1832  Dr. 
Rutcr  resigned  the  presidency,  with  a  view  of  re-entering  the 
pastoral  work.     He  was  trnnsf erred  to  the  Pittsburg  Confer- 


Augusta  CoLLEoiL/v^o^        '^  J        123 


ence,  where  he  labored,  with  distinguished  usefulness,  until 
April,  1837.  He  was  then  appointed,  by  Bishop  Iledding,  to 
the  great  mission  field  just  then  opening  in  Texas.  It  was 
while  in  pastoral  work  in  the  Pittsburg  Conference  that  he 
published  a  revision  of  Gregory's  "  Church  History."  His 
*'  Hebrew  Grammar  "  was  published  a  little  earlier.  Though 
a  close  scholar,  he  retained  all  the  fire  and  enthusiasm  of  a 
real  missionary. 

When,  on  the  eve  of  starting  for  Texas,  some  one  reminded 
him  of  the  distance  and  of  the  possible  dangers  of  the  field 
assigned  him,  his  thoughtful  response  was,  "  Heaven  is  no 
farther  from  Texas  than  from  Pennsylvania."  Toward  the 
last  of  the  year  he  entered  the  Republic.  His  advent  was 
hailed  with  delight.  His  labors  were  incessant,  but  were  soon 
terminated.     He  died  in  Washington,  Texas,  May  16,  1838. 

When  Dr.  Ruter  resigned  the  presidency.  Dr.  Tomlinson 
was  transferred  to  the  chair  of  natural  science  and  belles- 
lettres,  and  was  again  made  responsible  for  the  duties  of  the 
presidency.  Rev.  J.  H.  Fielding,  A.M.,  who  had  been  a 
professor,  and  for  a  time  the  president,  of  Madison  College, 
now  became  professor  of  mathematics  in  the  place  of  Dr. 
Tomlinson.  Professor  Fielding  retained  the  professorship  in 
Augusta  for  a  little  less  than  three  years.  He  then  resigned, 
and  soon  after  accepted  the  presidency  of  St.  Charles  Col- 
lege, Missouri,  where  he  labored  with  usefulness  for  a  num- 
ber of  years. 

Solomon  Howard,  an  alumnus  of  the  college,  was,  in 
1833,  principal  of  the  preparatory  department. 

In  1834  Frederick  Eckstein,  Esq.,  became  professor  of 
modern  languages ;  W.  W.  Wallingford,  English  tutor ;  Don 
Raphael  Espinoza,  teacher  of  Spanish  ;  and  Noah  Archbold, 
principal  of  the  j)reparatory  depai*tment. 


124  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

In  1835  Eev.  Joseph  M.  Trimble,  A.M.,  succeeded  Professor 
Fielding  in  the  department  of  mathematics.  He  was  a  native 
of  Ohio,  was  graduated  from  Ohio  State  University,  and 
joined  the  Conference  in  1829. 

The  catalogue  for  the  year  1836  gives  as  the  faculty  :  Rev. 
J.  S.  Tomlinson,  A.M.,  president;  Rev.  H.  B.  Bascom,  A.M., 
Rev.  J.  M.  Trimble,  A.M.,  and  Rev.  B.  H.  M'Cown,  A.M., 
professors ;  and  Abner  Chapman,  preceptor  of  the  prepara- 
tory department.^ 

At  the  session  of  the  Kentucky  Conference  for  1841  Tran- 
sylvania University  was,  through  Dr.  Bascom,  tendered  to 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  The  proposition  was  re- 
ferred to  a  committee,  which,  after  full  consideration,  report- 
ed, recommending  the  Conference  to  accept  the  offer.  This, 
Dr.  Tomlinson,  who  was  one  of  the  committee,  opposed,  on  the 
Conference  floor,  as  he  had  done  in  the  committee ;  but  the 
report  was  almost  unanimously  adopted,  and  the  Conference 
received  under  its  patronage  this  old  university. 

In  the  autunm  of  1842  Dr.  Bascom  retired  from  Augusta 
College,  to  accept  the  presidency  of  Transylvania  University. 
Professors  M'Cown,  Kemp,  and  Lynch  accepted  professor- 
ships under  him  at  the  same  time.  The  opening  at  Lexington 
was  brilliant.  The  friends  of  the  university  were  cheerful, 
believing  that  Transylvania  was  to  become  the  great  univer- 
sity of  the  South.  The  subsequent  career  of  Dr.  Bascom  is 
too  well  known  to  require  further  notice  here. 

The  withdrawal  of  these  men  from  Augusta  made  a 
reorganization  of  the  faculty  necessary.  The  faculty  for 
1842-43  consisted  of  Dr.  Tomlinson,  president ;  Rev.  Edmund 
W.  Sehon,  A.M.,  and  Rev.  Hermann  M.  Johnson,  A.M.,  pro- 
fessors ;  and  James  W.  King,  principal  of  the  preparatory  de- 
partment.    Mr.  Sehon  never  entered  upon  duty  as  professor. 


Augusta  College.  125 

Professor  Jolinson  was  graduated  from  the  Wesleyan  Univer- 
sity in  the  class  of  1839.  After  graduating  he  studied  mod- 
ern Greek  at  Yale  College.  He  resigned  a  professorship  in 
St.  Charles  College,  Mo.,  to  fill  a  similar  position  at  Au- 
gusta. In  December,  18-42,  Rev.  E.  N.  Elliott  was  elected 
professor  of  mathematics.  He  had  previously  taught  some 
time  in  Bloomington,  Ind.  Professor  Johnson  retired  from 
Augusta  in  1814,  and  was  for  a  time  in  the  faculty  of  Ohio 
Wesleyan  University.  He  was  a  very  mature  scholar  and  a 
noble  Christian  gentleman.  He  died  in  1868,  while  presi- 
dent of  Dickinson  College.  Professor  Chandler  Robbins, 
A.M.,  an  almnmcs  of  the  Wesleyan  University,  succeeded 
Professor  Johnson  in  Augusta.  A  few  others  for  brief 
periods  were  connected  with  the  instructional  departments 
of  Augusta. 

The  influences  which  began  to  be  felt  in  1842,  and  which 
were  intensified  by  the  division  of  the  Church  in  1844,  re- 
sulted in  the  repeal  of  the  charter  and  the  suspension  of  the 
college  in  1849. 

Having  followed  the  several  professors  to  the  end  of  their 
labors  in  the  college,  it  remains  to  say  something  further  of 
Dr.  Tomlinson.  He  was  the  first  to  enter  the  faculty  after 
the  death  of  the  lamented  Finley,  and,  with  Dr.  Durbin,  he 
organized  the  college  classes.  He  was  the  second  and  last 
president  of  the  college,  and  the  most  distinguished  for  va- 
ried learning  of  all  of  its  oflicers.  He  stood  by  the  college 
until  its  charter  was  repealed  and  its  doors  closed.  He  was 
subsequently  invited  to  chairs  in  some  of  the  best  colleges 
in  Ohio.  But  he  saw,  and  his  friends  saw,  that  he  was  no 
longer  the  strong  man  of  his  earlier  yeai-s.  Toward  the  last, 
clouds  began  to  settle  over  his  former  brilliant  intellect. 
They  occasionally  lifted,  only  to  return  more  densely  than 


126  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

before.  Ills  mental  sufferings  became  most  intense,  his  life 
a  burden.  Reason  was  at  length  overthrown,  and  he  fell  by 
his  own  hand.  A  most  affectionate  tribute  to  his  great  worth 
was  prepared  by  his  appreciative  friend  and  fellow-laborer, 
the  late  Dr.  Hermann  M.  Johnson,  president  of  Dickinson 
College,  and  published  in  Sprague's  "  Annals  of  the  Ameri- 
can Pulpit,"  to  which  the  reader  is  referred. 

THE    STUDENTS. 

Augusta  being,  for  a  number  of  years,  the  only  Methodist 
school  in  America  (or  in  the  world)  having  legal  authority  to 
confer  the  baccalaureate  and  other  degrees,  students  from 
distant  States  sought  its  advantages.  The  numbers  were  at 
no  time  great,  but  they  included  representative  young  men 
from  the  best  Methodist  families.  In  1829  a  small  class,  hav- 
ing completed  the  full  course,  was  admitted  to  tlie  degree  of 
bachelor  of  arts.  From  that  time  to  the  period  of  suspension, 
.by  the  repeal  of  the  charter,  a  class  was  graduated  every  year. 
One  hundred  and  fifty-three  students  were  thus  honored  dur- 
ing the  life  of  the  college.  Of  this  number  several  became 
distinguished  in  medical  practice,  a  still  larger  number  as 
judges  and  attorneys-at-law,  and  several  in  State  and  national 
halls  of  legislation ;  thirty-one  became  ministers,  several  of 
whom  were  called  to  important  posts  as  presidents  or  profes- 
sors in  the  various  Methodist  schools  that  opened  soon  after 
their  graduation.  Quite  a  number  of  our  most  distinguished 
ministers  and  other  gentlemen  of  prominence  received  from 
Augusta  the  master's  degree.  Honoris  Causa.  In  this  list 
are  Kevs.  H.  B.  Bascom,  Charles  Elliott,  John  H.  Fielding, 
James  H.  Logan,  B.  H.  M'Cown,  and  Oliver  M.  Spencer; 
Ross  "Wilkins,  Esq.,  and  Willis  Tannehill,  Esq. ;  Rev.  Mar- 
tin P.  Parks  ;  Waitman  T.  Willey,  Esq. ;  Revs.  Asbury  Ros- 


Augusta  College.  127 

zel,  G.  S.  Holmes.  George  Peck,  and  L.  L.  Ilamline ;  Newton 
Peck,  Esq.,  and  W.  R.  Harding,  Esq. ;  Revs.  Norvel  Wilson, 
and  D.  M.  Reese,  M.  D. ;  11.  H.  Martin,  Esq. ;  Revs.  W.  M. 
Dailey  and  J.  A.  Waterman ;  J.  D.  Ramsey,  Esq.,  and  J.  C. 
Williams,  Esq. 

The  degree  of  D.D.  was  given  to  Bishop  Elijah  Iledding, 
Bishop  William  Capers,  Wilbur  Fisk,  Samuel  Luckey, 
Stephen  Olin,  John  L.  Blake,  and  George  Peck ;  and  that  of 
LL.D.  to  Hon.  George  Robertson,  of  Kentucky ;  Hon.  John 
C.  Wright  and  lion.  Jolin  W.  Campbell,  of  Ohio ;  Hon. 
John  Boyle,  of  Kentucky  ;  Hon.  Benjamin  Watkins  Leigh 
and  Hon.  Thomas  Ewing,  of  Ohio ;  and  to  Hon.  John  Pit- 
man, of  Rhode  Island. 

The  list  of  non-graduate  alumni  is  much  longer  than  that  of 
those  who  tarried  to  graduation,  and  includes  names,  of  men 
living  or  dead,  which  have  become  well  and  honorably  known 
in  all  the  professions  and  in  various  business  pursuits.  In 
this  list  are  the  names  of  General  Doniphan,  of  Missouri ; 
Professor  M'Farland,  of  the  Ohio  State  University ;  W.  C. 
Dandy,  D.D.,  of  the  Rock  River  Conference;  Governor 
Robert  Wickliffe,  of  Louisiana ;  and  Bishop  R.  S.  Foster, 
D.D.,  LL.D. ;  and  of  others  too  numerous  to  mention. 

Methodism,  and  the  country  and  Church  at  large,  were 
greatly  blessed  and  benefited  by  the  establishment  and  con- 
tinuance, for  the  fourth  of  a  century,  of  Augusta  College. 
During  its  day  its  work  was  sublimely  grand.  Of  its  achieve- 
ments, Dr.  Redford,  the  historian  of  Kentucky  Methodism, 
bears  this  testimony:  "Its  faculty  was  composed  of  men  of 
piety,  genius,  and  learning;  and  in  all  the  learned  profes- 
sions in  almost  every  Western  and  Southern  State  its  alumni 
may  yet  be  found.  It  gave  to  the  medical  profession,  to  the 
bar,  and  to  the  pulpit  many  of  their  brightest  lights." 


128  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

A  reunion  of  old  Augusta  College  students  was  held  in  the 
college  building  on  the  17th  of  November,  1880. 

BUILDINGS,    LIBRARY,    APPARATUS,    ENDOWMENT. 

There  was  a  college  edifice,  before  described;  there  w^ere 
two  boarding-houses,  a  library  of  sixteen  hundred  Yolunies 
and  two  society  libraries,  and  physical  and  chemical  ap- 
paratus. The  basis  of  the  endowment  was  the  Bracken  Acad- 
emy Fund,  with  which  the  college  opened.  The  patron- 
izing Conferences  added  to  this.  The  whole  property  was 
valued  at  something  over  $50,000.  The  income  never  paid 
the  faculty  living  salaries.  The  repeal  of  the  charter  ren- 
dered uncollectable  all  outstanding  notes.  The  real  estate 
reverted  to  the  Bracken  Academy.  On  the  niglit  of  Jan- 
uary 28,  1852,  the  principal  building  was  destroyed  by  fire. 
The  trustees  of  the  academy,  aided  by  the  citizens  of 
Augusta,  soon  rebuilt  the  edifice. 

ITS   PRESENT   MANAGEMENT. 

On  the  10th  of  June,  1879,  the  writer,  a  native  of  Ken- 
tucky, a  graduate  of  Transylvania  University,  from  1851  to 
18G5,  a  member  of  the  Kentucky  Conference  of  the  Meth- 
odist Episcopal  Church,  South,  but  since  that  time  a  minister 
of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  leased  the  property.  In 
1882  he  secured  the  transfer  of  his  lease  to  the  Board  of  Ed- 
ucation of  the  Kentucky  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church,  under  whose  management  the  institution  is 
now  conducted,  open  to  both  sexes,  and  prospering  under  the 
name  of  Augusta  Collegiate  Institute.  It  is  without  endow- 
ment, and  depends  upon  the  tuition  and  boarding  fees  of  stu- 
dents for  its  support. 


Cazenovia  Seminary.  129 


CHAPTER  III. 

CAZENOVIA    SEMINARY. 

BY  BOSTWICK  HAWLEY,  D.D. 

After  the  destruction,  by  fire,  of  Cokesbnry  College,  at 
Abingdon,  Md.,  followed,  as  it  was,  a  few  years  later  by  the 
loss  of  the  second  institution  of  the  same  name  and  charac- 
ter, located  in  Baltimore,  Bishop  Asbury  concluded  that  at 
that  time  God  did  not  call  the  Methodists  of  America  to  the 
work  of  higher  education.  He,  therefore,  directed  his  atten^ 
tion  slowly  to  the  founding  of  schools  for  the  special  pur. 
pose  of  meeting  somewhat  the  needs  of  the  people  and  of 
improving  the  standard  of  the  ministry.  After  his  death, 
the  New  England  Conference  took  up  the  work,  and  in  1817 
opened  a  seminary  at  New  Market,  N.  H.  This  experiment 
at  that  extreme  point  not  proving  wholly  satisfactory,  the 
school  was  transferred,  in  1824,  to  Wilbraham,  Mass.,  where 
it  continues  to  flourish,  having  an  honorable  and  useful 
career. 

The  old  Genesee  Conference,  including  the  territory  of 
all  western  New  York,  Upper  Canada,  and  part  of  Pennsyl- 
vania, began  the  educational  work  in  1819,  when,  in  Confer- 
ence session,  it  was  resolved  "  to  open  a  seminary  of  learn- 
in<r  within  its  bounds."  Five  of  its  most  influential  mem- 
bers.  Revs.  Charles  Giles,  Abner  Chase,  William  Barlow, 
Jonathan  Iluestis,  and  Thomas  Madden,  were  appointed  a 
committee  to  report  a  plan  for  carrying  into  effect  this  reso- 
lution. A  favorable  report  was  made  and  adopted  at  the 
next   session   of  the   Conference.     About  this   time,   May, 


130  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

1820,  the  General  Conference  urged  the  Annual  Confer- 
ences to  move  in  the  work  of  education.  The  county  seat 
of  Madison  County,  ^N".  Y.,  having  been  removed  in  1817 
from  Cazenovia  to  Morrisville,  the  court-house  was  offered 
for  sale.  Cazenovia,  where  a  small  society  of  Methodists 
existed,  was  then  and  for  some  years  later  included  in  Man- 
lius  Circuit,  but  the  society  had  no  regular  place  of  wor- 
ship. Aided  by  friends  in  the  surrounding  region  they 
secured  this  substantial  building,  which  was  made  to  serve 
both  for  a  school  and  a  commodious  place  for  public  wor- 
ship. Here  they  opened  religious  services  in  the  spring  of 
1818.  It  was  a  successful  achievement,  effected  chiefly 
under  the  direction  of  that  quiet  but  wise  man,  Rev. 
George  Gary,  who  became  a  traveling  preacher  in  New 
England  at  the  age  of  sixteen  years,  and  presiding  elder  at 
twenty-three. 

The  purchase  of  the  court-house  aided  much  the  efforts  of 
Messrs.  Gary,  Giles,  and  other  friends  of  education  in  carry- 
ing througli  Conference  the  resolution  to  make  Cazenovia 
the  seat  of  the  contemplated  seminary.  Receiving  tlie  needed 
repairs  and  modifications,  the  building  became  the  home  of 
educational  and  religious  forces  long  cherished  by  the  students 
of  tlie  early  and  the  later  years,  and  where  thousands  have 
been  educated  and  hundreds  have  been  converted  to  Christ. 
In  1821  a  rival  for  the  permanent  location  of  the  seminary 
came  to  the  front.  The  people  of  Ithaca,  Tompkins  County, 
now  the  seat  of  Cornell  University,  promised  a  large  sub- 
scription and  a  building  to  the  Conference,  if  that  place  should 
be  selected  for  the  seminary.  Moved  by  this  flattering  offer, 
the  Conference  reconsidered  its  action  of  the  previous  year, 
and  selected  Ithaca,  and  Rev^  Dan  Barnes,  who  had  advo- 
cated the  measure,  was  made  the  Conference  agent  to  raise 


Cazenovia  Seminary.  131 

the  money  needed  to  ratify  the  engagement  and  to  found  the 
institution.  But  the  efforts  of  Mr.  Barnes  and  of  the  citi- 
zens of  Ithaca  not  being  successful,  the  Messrs.  Gary  and 
Giles,  who  had  the  advantage  of  being  presiding  elders  of 
contiguous  districts,  one  of  which  included  Cazenovia,  availed 
themselves  of  the  provisional  action  of  Conference  in  the 
premises,  and  renewed  their  efforts  in  favor  of  Cazenovia. 
They  raised  the  means  to  cancel  the  bond  against  the  court- 
house, and  to  provide  for  opening  the  school. 

The  Conference  of  1823  appointed  a  committee,  consisting 
of  three  of  its  leading  members,  Charles  Giles,  George  Gary, 
and  Elias  Bowen,  and  six  influential  laymen,  to  do^what  was 
deemed  necessary  to  open  the  institution  to  pupils.  Those 
associated  with  these  three  ministers  were  Jacob  Ten  Eyck, 
David  B.  Johnson,  Charles  Stebbins,  John  Peck,  Solomon 
Root,  and  Luther  Buell.  This  committee,  acting  as  a  board 
of  trustees,  empowered  Messra.  Gary  and  Giles,  who  were 
known  to  be  in  accord  with  the  whole  movement  and  with 
the  selection  of  Ciizenovia  as  the  seat  of  the  institution,  to 
raise  money,  by  donations  and  by  the  sale  of  short  scholar- 
ships, to  meet  the  expenses  of  opening  the  school  in  the 
court-house.  On  the  11th  of  December,  1824,  only  eight 
boys  were  enrolled,  because  of  the  impression  that  it  was  for 
boys  only.  Tliis  was  before  mixed  schools  and  the  co-educa- 
tion of  the  sexes  was  popular.  But  the  good  sense  of  Meth- 
odist women  decided,  with  the  acquiescence  of  the  managers, 
that  the  Genesee  Conference  Seminary  should  open  its  doors 
and  extend  its  advantages  to  all  worthy  youth,  without  regard 
to  sex  or  complexion.  Co-education  was  thus  early  estab- 
lislied  in  central  New  York,  an  action  that  has  now  for  more 
than  sixty  years  been  vindicated  on  a  large  scale.  During 
all  this  time  nothing  has  occurred  at  Cazenovia  Seminary  to 


132  Early  Schools  of  Mettiobtsm. 

cast  a  shadow  of  doubt  as  to  the  wisdom  of  the  policy — a 
policy  that  has  since  been  adopted  by  the  best  academies  and 
colleges  in  this  country.  The  above-named  committee  pro- 
cured from  the  Legislature  a  charter,  which  gave  to  the  insti- 
tution the  name,  "  The  Seminary  of  the  Genesee  Confer- 
ence." Tlie  name  has  very  naturally  been  changed  to  con- 
form to  the  successive  names  of  the  patronizing  Conferences 
embracing  the  institution,  such  as  Oneida,  and  now  Central 
"New  York.  But  whatever  its  chartered  name,  the  institu- 
tion has  long  been  known  as  the  Cazenovia  Seminary.  Not 
less  denominational  in  its  guardianship,  nor  less  religious  in 
character, 'it  is  not  embarrassed  by  a  distinctively  denomi- 
national or  sectarian  name.  Well  were  it  that  all  our  purely 
literary  institutions  were  equally  and  alike  unembarrassed. 
This  charter  was  dated  April  6,  1825,  naming  as  trustees 
Kevs.  George  Gary  and  Elias  Bo  wen,  and  Henry  Wells,  Esq., 
of  the  Jirst  class,  to  serve  one  year  ;  Hons.  Charles  Stebbins 
and  Jacob  Ten  Eyck,  and  Bev.  Charles  Giles,  of  the  second^ 
for  two  years ;  and  Hon.  D.  B.  Johnson,  John  W.  Peck,  Esq., 
and  Luther  Buell,  for  three  years.  Of  this  board  the  major- 
ity were  Methodists,  but  the  others  gave  their  services  and 
made  liberal  contributions,  with  equal  fidelity,  to  advance 
the  interests  of  the  school.  No  denominational  institution 
in  this  country  has  had  for  the  period  of  sixty  years  a  career 
of  greater  uniform  prosperity.  Other  institutions  of  this 
same  denomination  have  arisen  within  its  patronizing  terri- 
tory, have  flourished  for  a  time,  and  have  died  ;  but  this  one 
has  continued  to  prosper. 

A  brief  statement  of  the  more  obvious  conditions  of  its 
success  may  be  suggestive  and  instructive.  The  first  favor- 
ing condition  was  its  location.  Madison  County  is  near  the 
geographical  center  of  the  State.     Cazenovia  is  the  chief 


Cazenovia  Seminary.  133 

town  of  the  county.  Conference  boundaries  liave  frequently 
been  changed.  The  so-called  patronizing  territory  has  been 
diniinislied  on  all  sides ;  but  the  seminary  has  all  the  while 
been  centrally  located  and  easy  of  access.  The  early  tides  of 
settlement  set  that  way,  and  have  largely  continued  to  flow  in 
that  direction.     Prof.  Clements,  the  present  principal,  says  : 

Cazenovia  village,  in  which  the  seminary  is  situated,  is  in  the  midst 
of  one  of  the  most  fertile  and  delightful  sections  of  our  State.  An  ele- 
vation of  twelve  hundred  feet  above  the  sea-level  gives  it  a  pure  atmos- 
phere and  a  healthful  climate,  and  renders  it  free  from  many  of  those 
fatal  diseases  that  are  prevalent  in  many  parts  of  the  country.  The 
well-shaded  walks  and  beautiful  groves  are  inviting.  Excellent  roads 
and  picturesque  hills  afford  ample  opportunities  for  riding;  and  the 
Owagena — a  gem  of  water — furnishes  a  pleasure  resort  for  those  who 
seek  recreation  in  boating,  fishing,  and  swimming.  Both  nature  and 
art  have  l>een  lavish  in  their  adornment  of  the  place,  and  have  made  it 
peculiarly  adapted  to  the  purposes  of  a  seminary,  as  it  affords  opportu- 
nity for  esthetical  culture,  essential  to  the  full  development  of  youthful 
mind.  The  population  of  the  village  is  about  two  thousand,  and  the 
people  are  deeply  interested  in  the  character  and  success  of  the  school. 

In  its  first  and  subsequent  boards  of  trustees  is  found  an- 
other element  of  success.  Of  those  who  were  the  charter 
members  we  here  give  brief  portraitures,  as  draw^n  by  Rev. 
Dr.  William  Reddy : 

Rev.  Charles  Giles  was  a  man  of  genius,  piety,  and  power.  Born  in 
Connecticut,  in  1783,  he  closed  his  eventful  life  in  Syracuse,  N.  Y., 
August  30,  1867.  He  was  successively  connected  with  the  Philadel- 
I)lii:i,  New  York,  Genesee,  Oneida,  and  Black  River  Conferences.  He 
illk'd  the  most  responsible  positions,  including  that  of  presiding  elder 
and  of  delegate  to  General  Conference.  He  was  a  good  scholar,  rich 
in  facts,  brilliant  in  thought,  having  an  intense  love  for  mankind.  In 
liim  intellectual  power  and  emotion  were  united. 

Rev.  George  Gary's  name  was  a  household  word  during  this  period. 
When  but  in  his  sixteenth  year  his  name  appeared  in  connection  with 


134  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Barre  Circuit,  Vermont  District,  New  England  Conference.  In  1813 
he  was  ordained  elder,  and  transferred  to  the  Genesee  Conference.  A 
man  of  great  shrewdness  and  a  profound  judge  of  human  character, 
he  was  strong  in  the  pulpit,  where,  on  great  occasions,  he  was  over- 
whelmingly eloquent.     He  finished  his  course  with  joy,  March,  1855. 

Rev.  Elias  Bowen,  D.D.,  was  a  strong  man,  long  time  a  presiding 
elder,  positive  and  strong  in  his  likes  and  dislikes,  and  at  one  period  of 
his  life  was  a  foremost  witness  and  teacher  of  the  higher  spiritual  life. 
In  his  earlier  ministry  he  was  conservative,  and  in  his  later  years  rad- 
ical, on  the  subject  of  slavery  and  the  Church.  He  was  several  times  a 
member  of  the  General  Conference.  A  clear  and  able  writer,  he  con- 
tributed largely  to  the  periodical  literature  of  the  Church,  and  pub- 
lished sermons  on  education  and  other  important  subjects.  He  wrote 
a  volume  entitled  "Slavery  and  the  Church." 

Hon.  Charles  Stebbins  was  a  lawyer,  a  man  of  rare  judgment,  high 
moral  tone,  strong  social  position,  and  long  a  friend  of  the  seminary. 
In  1829  he  was  called  to  preside  over  the  Senate  in  place  of  Lieutenant- 
Governor  Throop,  who  had  been  called  to  the  chair  of  the  executive. 
He  was  the  secretary  of  the  board  of  trustees  of  the  seminary  at  its 
beginning.  For  sixty-three  years  he  had  the  confidence  and  respect  of 
a  large  circle  of  personal  friends.  He  died  at  Cazenovia,  March,  1873, 
in  his  84th  year. 

Hon.  Jacob  Ten  Eyck  was  of  Dutch  ancestry.  He  held  important 
ofiices  at  home,  and,  in  1844,  he  was  a  member  of  the  State  Assembly. 
Noted  for  his  integrity,  he  was  a  successful  merchant,  ever  ready  to 
assist  those  commencing  business,  and  by  his  opportune  advice  he  con- 
tributed to  lay  the  foundation  of  many  a  young  man's  character  and 
fortune.  With  other  trustees  he  gave  of  his  time  and  money  to  the 
seminary.  He  died  of  yellow  fever,  at  Savannah,  Ga.,  at  the  age  of 
sixty-seven  years,  leaving  to  his  family  as  his  best  legacy  a  high  char- 
acter. 

Hon.  David  B.  Johnson  w\t,s  a  lawyer  of  eminence.  For  many  years 
he  held  the  office  of  district  attorney  for  Madison  County.  He  was 
also  master  and  examiner  in  chancery.  For  a  long  time  he  was  secre- 
tary of  the  board  of  trustees  of  this  seminary,  as  he  was  also  attorney 
for  the  board,  often  saving  it  from  serious  losses. 

Mr.  Jackson,  one  of  the  earlier  students,  remembers  tluit,   in   the 


Cazenovia  Seminary.  135 

spring  of  1826,  he  saw  Mr.  Johnson,  with  the  late  B.  T.  Clark,  plant  the 
elm-tree  that  now  stands  in  the  front  of  the  central  seminary  building. 

John  W.  Peck,  of  Manlius,  was  an  efficient  member,  and  he  for 
awhile  served  as  agent  of  the  institution,  doing  in  each  capacity  excel- 
lent service. 

The  last  of  the  charter  members  was  Luther  Buell,  Esq.,  of  Manlius. 
At  the  date  of  the  semi-centennial  celebration  of  the  seminary  he  was 
the  only  one  of  the  original  board  left  to  witness  the  maturity  of  the 
school  after  a  history  of  half  a  century. 

Dr.  Newell  Wright,  Dr.  Josiah  Knowlton,  John  Williams, 
Eevs.  Drs.  Z.  Paddock  and  John  Dempster,  with  others,  were 
at  an  early  date  members  of  the  board,  and  rendered  valu- 
able services.  Kev.  Fitch  Keed  was  also  deeply  interested 
in  the  seminary,  and  was  a  judicious  adviser  of  the  originat- 
ors of  the  institution. 

Tliis  seminary  was  peculiarly  fortunate  also  in  its  first 
faculty  of  instruction.  Rev.  Nathaniel  Porter,  the  first  prin- 
cipal, was  a  native  of  Connecticut,  and,  though  bereft  in 
early  life  of  his  father,  he  made  his  way  to  New  York  city, 
where  he  was  converted,  under  the  labors  of  Rev.  John  Sum- 
merfield,  in  the  old  John  Street  Church.  At  the  Wesleyan 
Academy,  which  flourished  for  a  brief  time  in  New  York 
city,  Mr.  Porter  prepared  for,  and  entered,  Amherst  College ; 
but,  for  the  w^ant  of  means,  he  was  unable  to  complete  the 
course  of  study,  and  he,  therefore,  united  on  trial  with  the 
New  York  Conference,  and  was  appointed  junior  preacher 
on  the  Stamford  Circuit,  June  1,  1824.  After  a  successful 
ministry  of  a  few  months  he  was  providentially  called  to  the 
headship  of  this* new  institution,  having  as  his  associate  Mr. 
Hart,  then  a  member  of  Hamilton  College.  The  eight 
boys  with  whom  the  seminary  began  constituted  a  nucleus 
tliat  was  soon  increased  to  fifty  or  more,  and  at  the  close  of 


136  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

the  first  year  there  were  enrolled  one  hundred  and  fifty 
pupils.  A  man  of  prepossessing  appearance,  accomplished 
manners,  and  deep  piety,  Mr.  Porter  exerted  a  great  infln- 
ence  for  good  over  the  pupils  and  in  the  community.  But 
failing  health  compelled  him  to  resign  at  the  end  of  two 
years.  After  a  short  term  of  effective  services  as  a 
preacher  he  closed  his  eventful  life  at  Newark,  N.  J., 
August  17,  1831. 

The  next  principal  was  the  late  well-known  Augustus  W. 
Smith,  LL.D.,  subsequently  and  for  years  connected  with  the 
Wesley  an  University,  and  for  a  few  years  with  the  Naval 
Academy,  Annapolis,  Md.  His  associate  teachers  were 
I.  M.  Willmarth,  A.M.,  George  Hastings,  Kev.  Moses 
Adams,  Kev.  Nelson  Rounds,  A.M.,  J.  W.  Tyler,  A.M., 
Mark  H.  Beecher,  and  Nancy  Bliss.  Miss  Bliss  was  the 
daughter  of  Abel  Bliss,  of  Wilbraham,  Mass.,  of  whom 
Bishop  Asbury  said  :  "  He  was  educated,  not  spoiled,  at 
Cokesbury  College."  It  was  at  Wilbraham  that  tliis  lady 
was  educated  for  the  important  position  of  preceptress. 
Becoming  allied  in  marriage  to  Rev.  William  Smith,  of 
Canada,  she  served  faithfully  in  several  important  places  in 
that  province.  During  the  administration  of  Dr.  A.  W. 
Smith  the  seminary  had  great  prosperity,  and  rose  to  a  high 
rank,  so  that  in  1829  three  hundred  students  were  enrolled. 

Says  Dr.  Reddy,  in  "  First  Fifty  Years : " 

There  is  an  inspiration  in  success,  and  that  inspiration  is  seen  in  the 
measures  of  those  then  in  charge  of  the  institution^  The  number  of 
students  had  so  increased  that  the  place  was  too  strait  for  them.  It 
was,  therefore,  determined  to  build  larger,  and  a  committee  was  ap- 
pointed, consisting  of  George  Gary,  Newell  Wright,  John  Williams, 
and  D.  B.  Johnson,  to  erect  a  suitable  building  for  dormitories,  a 
boarding-hall,  and  a  laboratory.     The  result  was  the  large  three-story 


Cazenovia  Seminary.  137 

brick  structure  adjoining  the  original  building  on  the  west,  and  having 
accommodations  for  about  two  hundred  students. 

In  1831  Prof.  Smith  was  compelled  by  ill  health  to  retire 
from  the  duties  of  principal,  and  Professor  J.  Wadsworth 
Tyler  became  principal  j^o  tempore.  Professor  Tyler  had 
ample  qualifications  for  the  position,  and  did  excellent  service. 
Eev.  William  C.  Larrabee,  LL.D.,  succeeded  to  the  principal- 
sliip  at  the  beginning  of  the  fall  term  of  1831.  A  native  of 
Maine  and  an  alumnus  of  Bowdoin  College,  he,  at  the  age  of 
twenty-nine  or  thirty  years,  entered  upon  the  very  respon- 
sible duties  of  the  position,  having  the  reputation  of  a  good 
preacher  and  teacher,  but  especially  of  an  administrator,  as 
evinced  in  the  preparatory  department  of  Wesleyan  Univer- 
sity. Under  his  administration  the  seminary  was  so  tilled 
with  students  as  to  render  another  enlargement  of  the  struct- 
ure necessary.  Students  came  from  distant  parts  of  New 
York,  from  New  England,  Pennsylvania,  and  Canada.  Sus- 
tained, as  he  was,  by  an  able  corps  of  teachers,  he  brought 
the  institution  to  a  position  unsurpassed  by  any  other  of  its 
grade.  His  associates  in  instruction  were  men  who  rose  to 
positions  of  eminence,  namely  :  W.  H.  Allen,  LL.D.,  late  of 
Girard  College ;  John  Johnston,  LL.D.,  of  the  Wesleyan 
University;  Perlee  B.  Wilbur,  A.M.,  of  Cincinnati  Fe- 
male College;  and  Orlando  Blanchard.  Dr.  Larrabee  re- 
signed his  position  in  the  spring  of  1835,  and  the  vacancy 
was  tilled,  until  his  transfer  to  the  Wesleyan  University,  by 
Professor  John  Johnston,  Miss  Maria  Hamilton  serving  as 
preceptress.  She  was  soon  united  in  marriage  to  him,  and 
was,  for  many  years,  an  ornament  in  domestic  and  social  life 
at  Middletown,  Coim. 

The  next  regular  principal,  of  longer  service,  was  Rev. 
George  Peck,  D.D.,  a  man  of  scholarly  habits,  dignitied  and 


138  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

courteous  manners,  and  devoted  to  his  work.  Though  not  a 
collegian,  nor  familiar  with  the  management  of  a  school,  he 
nevertheless  took  to  the  duties  of  the  position  easily,  and  was 
held  in  esteem  by  the  teachers  and  pupils.  He  ranked  high 
all  his  subsequent  life  as  preacher,  editor,  and  author.  He 
was  followed  by  a  list  of  such  scholarly  men  as  George  G. 
Hapgood,  D.D.,  Henry  Bannisterj  D.D.,  Edward  G.  An- 
drews, D.D.,  and  by  other  men  of  ability  and  adaptation  to 
the  work.  The  corps  of  professors  at  that  time  consisted  of 
men  of  equal  iitness  for  their  work,  namely :  Henry  Bannis- 
ter, Bostwick  Hawley,*  Hermann  M.  Johnston,  Edward  Ban- 
nister, H.  R.  Clarke,  George  H.  Ninde,  Miss  Livia  Guernsey, 
as  preceptress,  and  others  named  above. 

Another  element  of  success  in  the  history  of  this  semi- 
nary was  the  age,  character,  and  habits  of  many  of  its  early 
pupils,  who  remained  long  enough  to  leave  a  good  impres- 
sion on  all.  As  a  general  thing  the  pupils  have  all  along 
been  from  excellent  families,  and  were  ambitious  to  improve 
their  opportunities.  Among  the  thousands  that  have  been 
there  educated,  some  have  failed  to  appreciate  and  to  im- 
prove the  offered  opportunities,  but  this  has  not  been  true  of 
the  great  majority.  Indeed,  such  have  been  the  govern- 
ment, the  examples  set  by  the  teachers,  and  such  the  moral 
atmosphere  of  the  school  and  village,  that  it  could  not  well 
be  otherwise  in  the  general  standing  of  the  students. 
Strong  religious  influences  prevailed,  revivals  were  frequent, 
and  many  trace  to  this  place  their  profoundest  and  most 
enduring  Christian  experience.     Since  its  opening,  in  1824, 

*  Mr.  Hawley  became  a  pupil  of  this  seminary  in  the  spring  of  1831,  was 
here  converted  and  prepared  for  college,  and  was  here  licensed  to  preach.  After 
graduation  from  college,  he  was,  for  a  term  of  years,  a  teacher,  and  thence 
entered  the  Oneida  Conference  as  an  itinerant  minister. 


Cazenovia  Seminary.  139 

at  least  fourteen  thousand  youth  have  up  to  this  date  been 
enrolled  as  students.  Of  these,  four  have  been  elevated  to 
the  episcopacy :  Jesse  T.  Peck,  Thomas  Bowman,  Edward 
G.  Andrews,  and  William  X.  Ninde.  Four  at  least  have  been 
governore  of  States,  namely  :  Joseph  R.  Hawley,  of  Connect- 
icut ;  Austin  Blair,  of  Michigan :  Caleb  Lyon,  territorial  gov- 
ernor ;  and  Leland  Stanford,  of  California.  The  following,  of 
the  first  decade,  became  presidents  of  colleges :  Edward  Ban- 
nister, University  of  the  Pacific;  Thomas  Bowman,  Indiana 
Asbury  (now  De  Pauw)  University ;  A.  W.  Cummings, 
M'Kendree  College  and  University  of  South  Carolina ;  B.  I. 
Diefendorf,  Fort  Plain  Female  College ;  Clark  T.  Hiniiian, 
North-western  University ;  H.  M.  Johnson,  Dickinson  Col- 
lege ;  Jesse  T.  Peck,  of  Dickinson  ;  George  H.  Round,  Fort 
Wayne  College ;  B.  F.  Tefft,  Genesee  College  ;  P.  B.  Wilbur, 
Wesleyan  Female  College  of  Cincinnati;  Erastus  Went- 
worth,  of  M'Kendree  College  ;  V.  L.  Hopkins,  Summerfield, 
Ala.,  and  Apalachicola,  Fla. ;  D.  C.  Van  Norman,  Rutger's 
Female  College;  and  J.  B.  Hurlburt,  Victoria  College. 
Di-s.  S.  M.  Vail,  Henry  Bannister,  and  W.  X.  Ninde  occu- 
pied chairs  in  Garrett  Biblical  Institute.  Of  the  students  of 
tlie  first  decade  were  Drs.  Luke  Hitchcock,  L.  L.  Knox, 
Bostwick  Hawley,  and  others  who  filled  professorships  in 
various  academies  and  colleges. 

All  along  in  its  history  this  institution  has  been  honored 
by  the  graduation  of  pupils  of  both  sexes  who  have  filled  hon- 
orable and  useful  positions  in  life.  Principal  Clements  gives 
the  following  corroboration  of  our  statement : 

Among  them  are  those  who  have  filled  some  of  the  most  prominent 
positions  within  the  gift  of  a  free  people.  Legislators,  governors,  gen- 
erals, judges,  bishops,  and  litterateurs  have  received  their  early  educa- 
tion within  its  walls.      They  are  found  in  nearly  every  part  of  the 


140  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

globe,  not  only  amid  the  energy  and  stir  of  cities,  but  also  on  the 
frontiers,  pushing  on  the  car  of  civilization  and  progress.  No  human 
arithmetic  can  estimate  the  intellectual  and  moral  power  that  such  an 
institution  exerts  through  so  large  a  body  of  alumni.  From  careful 
computation  it  has  been  found  that  more  than  six  hundred  young  men 
have  here  prepared  for  college,  three  thousand  have  been  here  con- 
verted to  Christ,  one  thousand  entered  the  Christian  ministry,  four 
hundred  the  law,  four  hundred  the  practice  of  medicine ;  more  than  one 
thousand  are  successful  business  men;  fifteen  hundred  are  engaged  as 
teachers  in  colleges,  academies,  and  other  schools;  and  nearly  all  have 
pursued  or  are  pursuing  honorable  and  useful  callings.  They  consti- 
tute a  roll  of  honor  of  which  the  seminary  may  justly  be  proud,  and 
which  may  well  bring  joy  to  the  hearts  of  those  who  have  aided  in  the 
development  of  such  characters. 

Still  another  element  of  success  is  the  uniform  religious 
character  of  the  institution.  Of  this  Rev.  Dr.  Reddj  has 
written : 

Cazenovia  Seminary  has  ever  been  distinguished  for  its  strong  and 
healthful  religious  influence.  Multitudes  have  been  born  of  God  within 
its  walls.  We  have  seen  how  the  faith  and  zeal  of  its  first  principal 
gave  the  key-note  to  the  religious  harmony  which  has  since  rung  out  on 
the  ear  of  the  Church  and  the  world.  Mr.  Larrabee's  views  and  spirit 
were  akin  to  those  of  Mr.  Porter,  and  he  gave  expression  of  them  in  his 
inaugural  address  in  speaking  of  '"  the  influence  of  religion  "  in  its  dis- 
ciplinary effects  on  the  moral  character  and  habits,  and  its  expanding 
influence  on  the  mind.  Attempts  have  been  made  to  establish  literary 
institutions  on  the  ground  of  infidelity,  but  the  efforts  have  ever  proved 
abortive.  Science  can  never  breathe  freely  except  in  an  atmosphere 
rendered  salubrious  by  healthful  breezes  from  the  Christian  paradise. 
Give  us  philosophy  and  religion  united. 

In  illustration  take  these  two  cases :  Hon.  James  Calla- 
nan,  of  Des  Moines,  Iowa,  educated  at  this  institution,  and 
the  Christian  giver  of  $25,000,  in  gratitude  for  advantages 
there    received ;    and   Rev.  Dr.  J.  P.   Newman,   who   has 


Cazenovia  Seminary.  141 

arisen  to  erudition  aud  masterly  eloquence,  the  foundations 
of  which  were  laid  at  this  his  lionored  alma  mater.  Many 
other  instances  of  the  happy  blending  of  education  and  relig- 
ion there  nurtured  might  be  cited.  Without  doubt  the 
positively  religious  character  of  the  seminary  did  much  to 
promote  its  prosperity. 

This  school  has  also  had  connected  with  it  several  literary 
and  religious  associations  that  have  contributed  not  a  little 
to  its  character  and  efficiency.  The  oldest  is  the  Temper- 
ance Society,  organized  December,  1830.  Very  popular  at 
first,  it  included  both  teachers  and  pupils.  Its  pledge  was  in 
accord  with  the  genius  of  reform  at  that  early  time,  and  was 
subsequently  so  modified  as  to  keep  in  harmony,  with  the 
advancing  sentiments  of  the  times.  For  several  years  this 
organization  served  the  purposes  of  a  debating  society,  and 
continues  in  active  force. 

The  seminary  Lyceum,  which  still  lives,  was  organized 
November,  1833,  by  the  enrolling  of  the  names  of  nine 
young  men  at  the  first  meeting,  who  also  were  its  charter 
members,  as  follows :  the  late  B.  F.  Tefi*t,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  ed- 
itor and  author ;  Cutler  F.  Field,  attorney  at  law ;  the  late 
Professor  W.  M.  Marsh ;  William  F.  Bailey,  son  of  the  late 
Bishop  Bailey,  of  Canada ;  II.  F.  Martin,  attorney ;  De  Witt 
C.  Yosburg,  late  of  Binghamton,  N.  Y. ;  the  late  Rev.  Pro- 
fessor George  B.  Cone ;  the  late  Hon.  Charles  II.  Doolittle ; 
and  Delos  Hopkins.  The  fiftietli^ anniversary  of  this  society 
was  duly  celebrated  in  connection  with  a  recent  commence- 
ment of  the  seminary. 

The  Theological  and  Missionary  Society  was  organized  in 
1835,  for  the  purpose  of  affording  to  candidates  for  the  minist 
try,  and  others,  special  opportunities  for  improvement  within 
the  broad  lines  indicated  by  its  name.    The  committee  to  draft 


142  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

a  form  of  constitution  were  :  Anson  W.  Cummings,  tlie  pro- 
jector of  this  volume ;  Silas  Fitch,*  a  useful  divine  and  edu- 
cator ;  and  Miss  Clark,  then  of  the  Free-Will  Baptist  Church. 
The  now  venerable  Isaac  L.  Hunt  was  its  first  president.  In 
1841  this  society  was  so  modified  as  to  admit  to  membership 
resident  members  of  the  Annual  Conference,  when  Rev. 
Elias  Bowen,  D.D.,  became  president ;  Principal  G.  G.  Hap- 
good,  D.D.,  vice-president;  Professor  Bostwick  Hawlej, 
D.D.,  secretary  ;  and  Professor  J.  L.  Alverson,  LL.D.,  treas- 
urer.    Of  these  later  gentlemen  Mr.  Hawley  alone  survives. 

The  Delta  Phi,  a  secret  fraternity,  had  only  a  brief  exist- 
ence. The  Philomatheian  Society,  organized  in  1843,  has 
had  a  continuous  and  useful  career,  possesses  a  good  library, 
and  has  an  enrolled  membership  of  more  than  one  thousand, 
of  whom  some  have  risen  to  distinction  as  lovers  of  learning. 
The  Adelphian  is  the  youngest,  has  an  ample  and  well-fur- 
nished hall  for  its  meetings,  and  is  in  a  prosperous  condition. 

This  brief  outline  of  the  origin  and  history  of  Cazenovia 
Seminary  shows,  in  part  only,  the  position  which  the  pio- 
neers of  American  Methodism  held  on  the  subject  of  popu- 
lar and  of  higher  education  at  a  time  when  those  who  were 
ignorant  of  the  origin  and  genius  of  this  Church  derided  her 
ministry,  methods,  and  people.  "  But  wisdom  is  justified  of 
her  children."  To-day  this  Church  stands  second  to  no  other 
in  her  high  aims  and  usefulness  in  all  that  constitutes  a  body 
of  intelligent,  scholarly,  and  useful  people.  For  the  promo- 
tion of  these  grand  aims  and  results  the  Cazenovia  Seminary 
ranks  high  in  the  corps  of  agencies. 

*  Died  since  this  article  was  written. 


Maine  Wesley  an  Seminary  and  Female  College.   143 


CHAPTER  lY. 

MAINE    WESLEYAN   SEMINARY  AND  FEMALE  COLLEGK 

BY   GEXERAL  JOHN  J.    PERRY. 

In  1821  Luther  Sampson,  of  Readfield,  in  the  State  of 
Maine,  a  respectable  farmer  of  that  town,  conceived  the  idea 
of  a  school  for  the  better  education  of  persons  designing  to 
enter  the  Methodist  ministry.  He  first  set  apart  one  hun- 
dred and  forty  acres  of  land  on  Kent's  Hill,  built  thereon  a 
house,  barn,  and  other  outbuildings,  supplied  the  establish- 
ment with  furniture,  farming  tools,  and  stock — the  whole 
costing  about  $4,500 — to  which  he  added  notes  of  hand 
amounting  to  $5,500,  making  in  all  $10,000. 

An  act  of  incorporation  was  procured,  under  the  name  of 
tlie  "Eeadfield  Religious  and  Charitable  Society,"  which 
provided  for  a  board  of  six  trustees.  To  this  board  the  prop- 
erty was  conveyed  in  1821,  Mr.  Sampson  drawing  his  own 
deed  with  an  exactness  and  skill  which  would  have  done 
credit  to  an  expert  draughtsman. 

The  school  was  commenced  the  same  year  as  a  manual- 
labor  school,  the  students  working  five  hours  a  day  to  pay 
for  their  board.  The  idea  was  popular,  and  there  was  quite 
a  rush,  especially  of  young  men  of  moderate  means,  to  the 
school. 

A  cheap  school  building,  three  stories  high,  whose  walls 
were  of  the  width  of  a  single  brick,  was  erected  by  the 
trnstees. 

The  school,  from  the  time  it  was  opened,  up  to  1825,  was 
taught,  first  by  Mr.  Henry  Baker,  and  then  by  Mr.  Sullivan 


144:  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Waiigb,  a  graduate  of  Bowdoin  College,  liis  father  at  that 
time  being  a  resident  of  Kent's  Hill. 

It  should  be  here  remarked  that  Elihu  Eobinson  had 
a  small  private  Bchool  at  Augusta  prior  to  this,  which, 
through  the  influence  of  Mr.  Sampson,  he  removed  to  Kent's 
Hill.  This  was  the  commencement  of  the  "  Sampson " 
School. 

The  charter  was  amended  in  1825,  and  the  board  of  trust- 
ees enlarged  from  six  to  twenty-five,  and  the  name  was 
changed  to  "  Maine  Weslejan  Seminary." 

The  same  year  Rev.  Zenas  Caldwell,  a  graduate  of  Bow- 
doin College,  was  elected  principal.  Mr.  Caldwell  was  a 
young  man  of  brilliant  talents,  the  chum  of  ex-President 
Franklin  Pierce,  while  in  college,  and  the  first  Methodist 
graduate  of  a  college  in  New  England.  His  administra- 
tion, as  principal  of  the  school,  was  a  marked  success.  The 
health  of  Mr.  Caldwell  gradually  gave  way  until  the  fall  of 
1826,  when  he  was  obliged  to  leave  the  school,  and  went 
home  to  his  father's,  in  Oxford,  to  die,  at  the  early  age  of 
twenty-six. 

At  the  spring  term,  1827,  Joshua  Randall,  Jr.,  was  em- 
ployed as  principal,  and  there  were  ninety-one  scholars  in 
attendance.  He  afterward  studied  law,  practiced  in  Dixfield, 
Me.,  and  other  places,  and  always  held  a  respectable  rank 
in  his  profession.  A  Dr.  Stevens  was  also  employed  a  por- 
tion of  the  spring  term  as  teacher  in  connection  with  Mr. 
Randall. 

In  the  fall  of  1827  William  C.  Larrabee  and  Merritt  Cald- 
well, then  in  their  junior  year  in  Bowdoin  College,  were  in 
charge  of  the  school.  Dr.  Larrabee,  in  one  of  his  posthu- 
mous paper.^,  says :  "  Mr.  Caldwell  and  myself  entered  upon 
our  duties  as  co-ordinate  teachers,  with  equal  authority,  and 


Maine  Wesleyan  Seminary  and  Female  College.  145 

the  term  was  a  pleasant  and  prosperous  one.  The  school  was 
large,  and  we  got  along  in  perfect  harmony." 

In  1828  Merritt  Caldwell,  before  named,  a  brother  of  Rev. 
Zenas  Caldwell,  having  graduated  with  high  honors,  was 
elected  principal,  and  he  held  the  place  continnously  until 
1834,  when  lie  resigned  to  accept  a  professorship  in  Dickin- 
son College,  which  place  he  held  up  to  the  time  of  his  death. 
Mr.  Caldwell  was  a  fine  scholar,  a  thorough,  skillful  teacher. 
Ilis  administration  were  years  of  uninterrupted  prosperity. 
His  first  term  was  attended  by  one  hundred  and  twenty-four 
students,  his  last  by  one  hundred  and  seventy-nine.  There 
was  a  gradual  increase  in  the  number  of  students  during  his 
entire  administration. 

Among  the  assistant  teachers  under  Mr.  Caldwell  were 
William  H.  Allen,  subsequently  professor  in  Dickinson  Col- 
lege, president  of  Pennsylvania  Agricultural  College,  and 
for  many  years  president  of  Girard  College ;  Charles  Col- 
lins, who,  for  a  long  period,  presided  over  colleges  in  the 
Southern  and  Middle  States;  and  Judge  James  Bell,  a 
lawyer  who,  during  his  life-time,  held  many  important  pub- 
lic trusts,  and  died  a  few  years  since  at  his  home  in  Skow- 
hegan.  Me. 

Of  the  many  students  during  Mr.  Caldwell's  term  of  office 
who  in  after  life  occupied  distinguished  positions  in  the  world 
may  be  mentioned  Gen.  Seth  Williams,  U.  S.  A. ;  ex-Mayor 
Franklin  Mussey,  of  Bangor;  Postmaster-General  and  United 
States  Senator  Timothy  O.  Howe,  of  Wisconsin ;  Pev.  Dr. 
Joseph  Cummings,  of  the  Wesleyan  University,  and  now  of 
the  North-western  Univei*sity ;  Dr.  Thomas  Sewell,  late  of 
Washington  ;  Bishop  Davis  W.  Clark;  ex-United  States  Sen- 
ator David  H.  Armstrong,  of  Missouri ;  Gen.  John  J.  Perry 
and  Hon.  E.  K.  Smai*t,  members  of  Congress  from  Maine ; 


146  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Judges  Parker  Tuck  and  Nathan  Longfellow;  Paymaster 
Bridges,  of  tlie  United  States  !N"avj;  Rev.  Edward  Cook, 
j^resident  of  Lawrence  University,  Wilbraham  Academy,  and 
Claflin  University ;  and  Hon.  E.  B.  Washburn,  ex-Secretary 
of  State,  Minister  to  France,  and  eighteen  years  member  of 
Congress. 

Rev.  William  C.  Larrabee,  LL.D.,  the  chum  of  Mr.  Cald- 
well in  college,  was  elected  principal  to  fill  the  vacancy  occa- 
sioned by  the  resignation  of  the  latter,  and  he  entered  uj)on 
his  duties  at  the  fall  term,  1835. 

Rev.  Benjamin  F.  Tefft,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  since  a  distinguished 
teacher,  preacher,  and  author,  was  Mr.  Larrabee's  assistant. 

Dr.  Larrabee  held  his  position  until  1840.  Mr.  Teift  re- 
mained assistant  four  years,  when  he  resigned  and  entered 
the  ministry.  Rev.  Charles  F.  Allen,  D.D.,  then  an  under- 
graduate in  Bowdoin  College,  took  his  place  and  tauglit  one 
term. 

In  scholarship  and  solid  learning  Dr.  Larrabee  was  not 
inferior  to  either  of  his  distinguished  predecessors.  But  in 
many  respects  he  was  unlike  either.  Merritt  Caldwell  had 
a  cool,  well-poised,  calculating  mind,  and,  upon  slight 
acquaintance,  appeared  distant,  and  not  easily  approached. 
Dr.  Larrabee  had  a  genial  nature,  in  which  the  social  ele- 
ment predominated,  and,  without  form  or  ceremony,  he  at 
once  put  every  one  at  ease  who  approached  him.  As  a 
teacher  he  was  an  enthusiast,  and  his  pupils  very  natui-ally 
caught  the  inspiration,  and  made  rapid  progress  in  their 
studies.  In  discipline  he  made  little  show  of  the  form  of 
government,  and  it  was  very  seldom  that  a  student  took 
advantage  of  him. 

As  to  his  success  at  Kent's  Hill,  Dr.  Tefft,  who  was  so 
long  associated  with  him,  says,  in  a  letter :  "  The  school  at 


Maine  Wesley  an  Seminary  and  Female  College.  147 

once  filled  up  to  its  utmost  capacity,  the  whole  system  of 
classification  and  study  was  revised,  and  considerably  ex- 
panded; great  pains  were  taken  to  elevate  the  standard 
of  scholarship,  and  rouse  the  ambition  of  pupils;  a  lofty 
tone  of  religious  and  literary  feeling  prevailed  within  its 
walls." 

Dr.  Larrabee  found  the  school  with  one  hundred  and 
seventy-four  scholars,  and  left  it  with  two  hundred  and 
twenty  seven,  a  record  of  which  any  man  might  feel  justly 
proud.  Dr.  Larrabee  had,  also,  as  an  assistant  in  the  classical 
department,  Mr.  Andrew  M.  Walsh,  a  native  of  Ireland,  and 
graduate  of  Dublin  University.  He  was  a  man  of  scholarly 
ability,  a  perfect  cyclopedia  of  knowledge. 

About  this  time  the  institution  became  involved  in  deep 
financial  embarrassment.  The  furniture  shop,  in  which  some 
fifty  or  sixty  students  had  up  to  this  time  worked  to  pay 
their  board,  proved  a  great  financial  failure.  The  goods 
made  therein  proved  of  so  poor  a  quality  that  they  would 
scarcely  bring  enough  to  pay  for  the  stock  out  of  which 
they  were  manufactured.  The  pet  scheme  of  a  "man- 
ual-labor department,"  desirable  as  it  was,  proved  a  com- 
plete financial  failure,  and  had  to  be  abandoned  by  the 
trustees. 

The  institution  was  heavily  in  debt,  creditors  became  im- 
patient, and  suits  were  commenced,  executions  recovered, 
and  served  upon  the  treasurer.  All  available  funds,  consist- 
ing of  notes  and  accounts,  were  turned  over  to  the  creditors, 
leaving  a  large  balance  of  debt  unprovided  for. 

In  the  winter  of  1841  Kev.  Stephen  Allen,  D.D.,  then 
teacher  of  mathematics  in  Troy  Conference  Academy,  was 
elected  principal  of  the  seminary.  In  March  following  he 
iciiioved   to  Kent's  Hill  and  entered  upon  his  work.     The 


148  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

condition  of  the  institution  was  a  great  surprise  to  liinij  and 
every  thing  looked  discouraging. 

The  institution,  however,  liad  become  widely  known,  and 
had  acquired  celebrity  as  a  school ;  students  in  large  num- 
bers continued  to  flock  to  it,  in  spite  of  \ery  uninviting  ac- 
commodations, and  the  school  went  on  performing  a  grand 
service  by  the  hard  work  and  sacrifices  of  the  teachers. 

The  school  again  opened  with  an  encouraging  number 
of  students.  Mr.  G.  W.  Jewett  was  the  cliief  assistant, 
and  Miss  Mary  Ann  Moody  was  preceptress.  They  were 
thorough  teachers.  The  term  was  successful,  and  the 
exhibition  passed  off  with  the  usual  eclat 

Mr.  Jewett  and  Miss  Moody  then  resigned,  and  Charles  F. 
Allen,  A.B.,  a  recent  graduate  of  Bowdoin  College,  was  chosen 
assistant,  and  rendered  excellent  service.  Mr.  Allen  subse- 
quently became  a  distinguished  preacher.  He  received  from 
liis  ahna  mater,  and  also  from  the  Wesleyan  University, 
the  honorary  title  of  D.D.  Miss  Caroline  Sturdevant  was 
chosen  preceptress.  In  the  fall  of  1843  Mr.  C.  F.  Allen 
having  entered  the  ministry,  Henry  P.  Torsey  was  chosen 
assistant. 

At  the  close  of  the  academic  year,  June,  1844,  tlie  princi- 
pal, finding  the  financial  burden  heavier  than  he  could  bear, 
and  suffering  in  health,  resigned  his  office,  and  entered  the 
ministry  of  the  Maine  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church. 

Dr.  Allen  was  a  fine  scholar,  a  faithful  teacher,  and,  not- 
withstanding the  embarrassments  which  seemed  to  meet  him 
at  every  point,  did  excellent  work  for  the  institution. 
Subsequently,  as  financial  agent,  and  in  the  erection  of 
Sampson  Hall,  he  did  a  grand  work,  which  will  long  be 
remembered  by  the  friends  of  the  school. 


Maine  TVesleyan  Seminary  and  Female  College.    149 

Henry  P.  Torsey,  the  assistant,  was  elected  principal,  and 
entered  upon  his  duties  at  the  fall  term  of  1844.  B.  W. 
Norris  was  assistant,  and  Miss  Emma  J.  Robinson  (since  the 
wife  of  Dr.  Torsey),  preceptress.  Students  attending  tliis 
term — males,  forty-eight;  females,  thirty-four.  It  was  a 
dark  day  for  the  institution.  It  hung,  trembling  in  the 
balance,  between  life  and  death.  The  trustees  became 
entirely  discouraged,  and  at  the  session  of  the  Maine  Con- 
ference, at  Bangor,  in  the  previous  August,  resigned  the 
trust  to  it — in  accordance  with  a  provision  in  the  deed  by 
which  the  real  estate  of  the  seminary  was  held  in  the  con- 
veyance to  them.  The  Conference  promptly  declined  to 
accept  the  trust. 

Soon  after  the  tnistees  met  at  Kent's  Hill,  and  decided  to 
make  one  more  effort  to  retrieve  the  affairs  of  the  institution. 
Eev.  Daniel  B.  Randall,  a  member  of  the  Maine  Conference, 
was  engaged  to  act  as  agent  to  raise  money  to  settle  with  the 
creditors  of  the  institution,  to  beg  up  the  scholarships,  and  to 
erect  a  new  seminary  building. 

Luther  Sampson,  the  founder  of  the  institution,  was  then 
living,  and  cheerfully  concurred  with  the  trustees  in  cancel- 
ing certain  annuities,  which  had  become  burdensome,  and 
advanced  $1,500  toward  the  erection  of  the  new  building. 
Mr.  Allen  relinquished  a  claim  of  §1,000  due  him  for  serv- 
ices. Rev.  Ezekiel  Robinson,  then  and  long  afterward  a 
leading  and  influential  preacher  in  the  Maine  Conference,  took 
a  deep  and  lively  interest,  and  rendered  very  important  aid,  in 
this  enterprise.  AVith  the  efficient  aid  and  encouragement 
rendered  him  the  agent  was  successful.  The  debts  of  the 
institution  were  settled  at  a  large  discount.  The  scholar- 
ships, or  claims  for  tuition,  were  surrendered,  and  funds  se- 
cured for  the  erection  of  a  new  building.     Henry  P.  Toi*sey, 


150  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

the  new  principal,  then  in  the  vigor  of  early  manhood,  com- 
menced his  grand  career  of  thirty-eight  years  of  administra- 
tion at  the  head  of  the  school,  and  resolved  not  only  to  save 
it,  but  to  make  it  an  institution  worthy  of  the  denomination 
and  an  honor  to  the  State.  At  this  point  the  seminary 
made  a  new  departure.  The  catalogue  for  the  year  ending 
June,  1846,  gave  pretty  sure  evidences  of  returning  prosper- 
ity. The  students  numbered  ninety-eight  gentlemen  and 
sixty-five  ladies,  an  increase  of  eighty-two,  tlms  doubling  tlie 
number  of  pupils.  The  next  year  the  number  run  up  to 
two  hundred  and  fourteen.  In  1848  it  had  three  hundred 
and  fourteen ;  and  at  the  end  of  the  decade,  1850,  with  but 
two  terms  in  the  year,  the  aggregate  attendance  was  three 
hundred  and  two. 

The  limits  of  this  article  will  oblige  me  to  pass  over  the 
next  decade,  from  1850  to  1860,  with  only  brief  references 
to  some  of  the  improvements  and  advances  made. 

Dr.  Torsey,  during  these  ten  years,  remained  at  the  liead  of 
the  scliool,  and  had  as  teacher  in  the  chissical  and  mathemat- 
ical departments  the  Rev.  .Francis  A.  Robinson,  A.M.,  Ph.D., 
who  occupied  the  position  of  professor  in  the  school  for  over 
twenty  years,  when  he  resigned  to  accept  a  professorship  in 
the  Pennsylvania  Agricultural  College.  He  was  afterward 
professor  in  the  R.  B.  Dunn  normal  department  four  years, 
and  one  of  the  most  popular  teachers  in  the  seminary.  Mrs. 
Emma  J.  Torsey  was  preceptress  up  to  1859,  a  period  of 
fourteen  years.  The  school  became  so  large  that  other  teach- 
ers had  to  be  employed,  and  among  them  Miss  Phronie  B. 
Robinson  was  a  popular  teacher  of  drawing  and  painting  for 
twenty-four  years.  In  1856  three  hundred  and  seventy-four 
students  were  enrolled.  The  large  increase  in  the  attend- 
ance of  the  ladies  was  owing  to  tlie  establishment  of  a  female 


Maine  Wesley  an  Seminary  and  Female  College.    151 

depai'tiueiit,  designed  to  give  ladies  a  tlioroiigli  tlirce  or  four 
years'  course  of  study. 

The  name  of  the  school  was  al)out  this  time  changed  to 
"Maine  AVesleyau  Seminary  and  Female  Collegiate  Insti- 
tute," which  three  last  words  were  afterward  changed,  by  act 
of  the  Legislature,  to  the  more  sensible  name  of  "  Female 
College,"  by  which  it  is  now  known.  By  this  time  better 
scliool  accommodations  became  an  absolute  necessity.  I 
have  before  me  a  circular,  signed  by  Dr.  Stephen  Allen, 
agent,  under  date  of  May  10,  1856,  in  which  he  says:  "The 
friends  of  the  Maine  Wesleyan  Seminary  have  recently  un- 
dertaken to  erect  a  new  edifice  that  will  contain  boarding 
accommodations  for  one  hundred  and  fifty  students."  The 
building  here  spoken  of,  now  known  as  "  Sampson  Hall,"  was 
completed  arnd  dedicated  in  1859. 

By  the  generosity  of  individuals,  and  some  of  the  Method- 
ist churches,  the  interior  was  finished  and  furnished.  This 
building  contains  a  chapel,  parlors,  recitation -rooms,  and 
boarding  accommodations  for  one  hundred  and  forty  stu- 
dents, cost  over  $50,000,  and  is  one  of  the  best  school  build- 
ings of  the  kind  in  the  country.  The  erection  of  this  edifice 
was,  at  the  time,  a  great  undertaking,  but  it  was  nobly  met 
by  the  friends  of  the  school.  Dr.  Stephen  Allen,  then  acting 
as  financial  agent,  had  the  oversight  of  the  work,  and  not 
only  proved  himself  a  good  financier,  but  a  safe,  prudent, 
energetic  business  man.  He  managed  to  keep  the  credit  of 
the  institution  in  good  repute,  and,  with  remarkable  tact, 
carried  the  enterprise  through  to  a  successful  termination. 

The  establishment  of  a  full  college  course  for  ladies,  con- 
ferring upon  them  the  degree  of  Artiinn  Baccalcturea^  was 
a  step  in  advance  of  any  other  school  in  New  England.  The 
grand  position  assumed   by  this  school  in  regard  to  female 


152  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

education  was  an  "  alarm  bell "  to  the  regular  colleges,  who 
very  soon  opened  their  doors  to  women — not  as  a  matter  of 
choice,  but  of  necessity. 

The  lirst  college  graduate  from  the  institution  was  Miss 
Lizzie  A.,  daughter  of  Dr.  Stephen  Allen,  in  1862,  and  not  a 
single  commencement  has  since  passed  without  graduating 
more  or  less  from  the  college  course ;  in  1868  thirteen  young 
ladies  graduating.  And  to  the  credit  of  its  college  graduates 
it  should  be  said,  that  they  stand  second  to  none  in  literary 
attainments  or  scholarship,  either  as  teachers  or  in  the 
learned  professions. 

The  next  decade,  from  1860  to  13Y0,  was  a  period  of  unin- 
terrupted prosperity.  The  spring  catalogue  of  1860  showed 
the  whole  number  of  students  for  the  year  to  be  four  hundred 
and  fifty-two ;  that  of  1870,  five  hundred  and  thirty-two. 

At  this  time  the  school  had  become  so  large  that  a  new 
building  seenied  necessary,  as  the  classes  were  every-where 
crowded.  And  here,  again,  the  friends  of  the  institution 
came  to  the  rescue. 

Samuel  K.  Bearce,  Esq.,  a  lumber  merchant  of  Lewiston, 
and  a  man  of  wealth,  who  had  already  been  a  liberal  donor 
to  the  school,  and  who  had  for  many  years  been  one  of  tbe 
trustees,  came  forward  and  offered  to  give  some  $25,000 
toward  the  erection  of  a  new  building,  provided  the  sum 
could  be  made  up  to  at  least  $40,000. 

The  proposition  was  met,  and  the  result  was  the  erection 
of  the  splendid  structure  known  as  "Bearce  Hall,"  costing 
about  $45,000.  This  is  one  of  the  most  elegant  and  beautiful 
school  buildings  to  be  found  in  the  country.  Mr.  Bearce 
was  one  of  the  best  friends  the  school  ever  had,  and  at  liis 
death,  in  addition  to  all  his  former  gifts,  he  left  the  institu- 
tion a  legacy  of  $13,000,  which  it  lias  since  received.     In 


Maine  Wesleyan  Seminary  and  Female  College.     153 

the  tower  of  Bearce  Hall  was  placed  a  large,  fine-toned  bell, 
a  gift  from  the  Hon.  James  G.  Blaine. 

From  1870  to  1880  the  institution  continued  to  prosper. 
The  average  number  of  students  per  year  during  this 
decade  was  over  five  hundred  and  fifty,  and  in  numbers  the 
gentlemen  led  the  ladies  only  a  small  per  cent. 

In  1882  Henry  P.  Torsey,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  who  had  been  a 
continuous  teacher  in  the  school  thirty-nine  years— one  year 
as  assistant,  and  thirty-eight  years  as  president— declined 
a  re-election.  For  thirty-eight  years  he  had  been  annually 
re-elected  by  the  board  of  trustees  president  of  the  institu- 
tion. He  took  the  school  when  it  was  bankrupt,  without 
suitable  buildings  or  financial  credit,  and  comparatively 
without  pupils  or  friends,  and  for  years,  assisted  only  by 
Francis  A.  Robinson,  and  his  estimable  wife,  Mrs.  Emma  J. 
Torsey,  in  the  teaching  department,  receiving  with  them,  by 
way  of  salaries,  nothing  but  the  scanty  amounts  collected  for 
tuition,  amounting  to  a  few  hundred  dollars,  and  has  brought 
it  up  to  the  rank  and  condition  of  one  of  the  most  prosper- 
ous popular  literary  institutions  in  the  whole  country. 

Dr.  Torsey  possesses  naturally  a  strong,  vigorous  constitu- 
tion, capable  of  great  physical  endurance,  yet  the  wear  and 
tear  to  both  body  and  mind  of  nearly  forty  years'  continuous 
hard  work  in  this  institution  was  too  great  a  strain  upon  him, 
and  for  several  years  before  he  left  the  school  he  suffered 
greatly  from  bodily  indisposition,  produced  by  overwork. 

Dr.  Toi*sey  has  had  during  his  life-time  under  his  care  at 
least  twenty  thousand  students,  and,  as  a  popular  educator, 
stands  second  to  none  in  the  country.  These  students  are 
scattered  all  over  the  country,  many  of  them  being  indebted 
to  the  doctor  not  only  for  instruction,  but  for  financial  aid, 
when  struggling  for  an  education.     Many  of  hit?  old  pupils 


154  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

have  acquired  eminence  and  distinction  in  the  literary,  pro- 
fessional, and  political  world,  thereby  reflecting  great  credit 
on  their  alma  mater ^  and  the  distinguished  teacher,  who  so 
long  stood  at  its  head.  Dr.  Torsey  is  now  ^''Emeritus  pro- 
fessor"  of  metaphysics  in  the  institution,  and  its  acting  finan- 
cial agent,  and,  although  broken  down  in  health,  has  lost 
none  of  his  old-time  interest  in  the  success  of  the  institution. 

Dr.  Torsey  was  succeeded  by  Kev.  Edgar  M.  Smith,  A.M., 
as  president.  Mr.  Smith  is  a  graduate  of  the  Wesleyan  Uni- 
versity at  Middletown,  Conn.,  of  the  class  of  1871,  and  was 
for  some  time  a  tutor  in  that  institution.  He  subsequently 
entered  the  regular  ministry  and  occupied  some  of  the  most 
important  appointments  in  the  old  Providence  Conference. 
In  his  present  position  he  has  already  acquired  an  excellent 
standing,  and  shown  himself  a  gentleman  well  qualified  for 
the  responsible  trust.  He  is  a  fine  scholar,  an  apt,  thorough 
teacher,  and  popular  with  his  students. 

Rev.  Joseph  L.  Morse,  A.M.,  for  years  was  professor  of 
ancient  languages,  and  was  a  very  thorough,  popular  teacher. 
In  1880  he  resigned  his  position  to  accept  a  position  in  the 
North-western  University  at  Evanston,  111. 

Rev.  A.  Fittsroy  Chase,  A.M.,  was  also  a  successful  teacher, 
as  professor  of  mathematics  and  English  literature  for  many 
years.  He  is  now  principal  of  the  East  Maine  Conference 
Seminary  at  Bucksport.  Among  those  who  have  made  large 
contributions  to  the  seminary  are  the  late  Luther  Sampson, 
$11,500;  Eliphalet  Clark,  M.D.,  late  of  Portland,  $50,000; 
Samuel  A.  Bearce,  late  of  Lewiston,  $35,000 ;  Hon.  Reuben 
B.  Dunn,  of  Waterville,  $11,000;  Hon.  William  Deering,  of 
Chicago,  $11,000 ;  Rev.  E.  Gammon,  of  Chicago,  $7,000. 

The  value  of  the  property  now  owned  by  the  institution  is 
over  $200,000,  and  not  encumbered  with  debts.     The  legacy 


Maine  Wesleyan  Seminary  and  Female  College.  155 

of  the  late  Dr.  E.  Clark,  of  $50,000,  will  not,  probably,  uiulur 
the  teriiifi  of  the  will,  be  available  for  about  ten  years. 

The  whole  number  of  students  who  have  been,  in  whole  or 
in  part,  educated  at  this  institution  are  over  twenty-five  thou- 
sand. Of  these  about  eight  thousand  became  teachers,  five 
hundred  clergymen,  four  hundred  physicans,  three  hundred 
and  fifty  attorneys.  Three  hundred  have  received  diplomas 
as  regular  graduates  from  the  courses. 


156  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTEE  Y. 

THE  GENESEE  WESLEYAN  SEMINARY. 

BY  J.   E.   BILLS,   D.D. 

By  the  division  of  the  Genesee  Conference,  in  1828,  the 
institution  of  learning  known  as  the  seminary  of  the  Genesee 
Conference  fell  into  the  territory  of  the  Oneida  Conference. 
At  the  first  session  after  the  division,  1829,  at  Perry,  N.  Y., 
on  motion  of  Glezen  Fillmore  and  Loring  Grant,  a  committee 
was  appointed  to  obtain  information,  and,  at  the  next  session, 
report  a  plan  for  the  erection  of  a  seminary  within  the  bounds 
of  the  Genesee  Conference.  The  proposition  was  adopted 
with  enthusiasm,  and  Glezen  Fillmore,  Abner  Chase,  Loring 
Grant,  Asa  Abell,  and  John  Copeland  were  appointed  the 
committee. 

This  committee  entered  vigorously  upon  its  work,  canvass- 
ing the  entire  territory,  and  receiving  propositions  from  the 
towns  and  villages  solicitous  of  securing  the  advantages  of 
such  an  institution.  At  the  next  Conference,  held  in  Eoch- 
ester,  1830,  the  committee  reported  that  very  cordial  invi- 
tations and  generous  aid  had  been  tendered  by  the  citizens  of 
Perry,  Lima,  Henrietta,  Le  Eoy,  and  Brockport,  to  secure  the 
location  of  the  seminary  at  one  of  these  places. 

Having  explained  the  conditions  attending  the  propositions 
of  these  several  places,  the  committee  concluded  by  recom- 
mending Lima,  as  the  most  eligible  and  available  place  for 
the  proposed  school.  The  committee  also  recommended  that 
the  title  of  the  institution  should  be  Genesee  Weslcyan  Sem- 
inary, to  be  under  the  control  of  a  board  of  nine  trustees,  five 


The  Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary.  V67 

of  wlioin  should  be  meinbers  of  tlie  Genesee  Conference ; 
the  property  to  be  managed  by  the  board  of  trustees,  and 
the  trustees  and  a  board  of  visitors  to  constitute  a  joint  board 
to  employ  teachers  and  other  agents  for  conducting  the 
seminary.  These  recommendations  were  adopted  by  the 
Conference.  Lima  became  the  location,  and  Revs.  Abner 
Chase,  Glezcn  Fillmore,  Eichard  Wright,  Loring  Grant, 
Micah  S eager,  Francis  Smith,  and  Messrs.  A.  A.  Bennett, 
Erastus  Clark,  and  Ruel  Blake  were  elected  the  first  board 
of  trustees.  The  first  board  of  visitors  were  Revs.  Asa  Abell, 
J.  Huestis,  Israel  Chamberlayne,  M.  Tooker,  and  C.  Y.  Ad- 
gate,  from  the  Conference ;  also  Rev.  John  Barnard,  John 
Lawber,  Dr.  C.  Bannister,  and  Dr.  T.  M.  Town.  The  same- 
Conference  appointed  Loring  Grant,  J.  Copeland,  G.  Laning, 
Mr.  Asahel  House,  and  Mr.  Frederick  House  a  building  com- 
mittee, with  Loring  Grant  as  superintendent  of  the  building, 
and  John  Copeland  was  elected  the  first  agent. 

These  boards  and  committees  entered  at  once  upon  their 
several  duties.  The  building  was  put  under  contract  on  the 
4th  of  January,  1831,  to  be  completed  on  the  1st  of  Marcli, 
1832.  The  edifice  was  to  be  of  stone.  The  main  south 
front  was  to  be  one  hundred  and  thirty  feet,  with  a  depth  of 
forty  feet,  three  stories  high,  with  a  basement  and  an  observ- 
atory. There  were  to  be  two  wings,  twenty-four  by  fifty 
feet,  and  two  stories  high.  The  cost  was  something  less  than 
$20,000.  At  the  first  meeting,  the  board  of  trustees  was  per- 
manently organized  by  the  election  of  Rev.  Abner  Chase  as 
president,  and  Augustus  A.  Bennett  as  secretary.  A  corre- 
spondence was  opened  by  the  secretary  to  secure  teachei*s  to 
be  ready  for  the  opening  of  the  school  on  the  1st  of  May,  1832. 
Uev.  John  P.  Durbin,  A.M.,  tlien  professor  of  languages  in 
Augusta  College,  was  tendered  the  principalship,  but  was  not 


158  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

able  to  accept  the  position.  On  tlie  18th  of  January,  1832, 
Eev.  John  Dempster  was  elected  principal,  and  Kev.  Samuel 
Luckej  was  the  substitute,  if  Mr.  Dempster  sliould  decline 
the  position.  At  the  same  meeting  of  the  board  Thomas  J. 
Rugar,  A.  B.,  was  elected  professor  of  mathematics ;  John 
Hutton,  A. B.,  professor  of  languages;  D.  B.  Wakefield, 
teacher  of  English  ;  Lord  Sterling,  assistant  in  English ;  and 
Miss  Eliza  S.  Eogers,  teacher  in  the  female  department. 

The  salary  of  the  principal  was  fixed  at  $700  ;  the  teachers 
of  mathematics  and  languages,  each  $500 ;  the  teacher  of 
English,  $400 ;  his  assistant,  $200 ;  the  preceptress,  $120  and 
board;  and  the  agent,  $325.  The  steward.  Rev.  Loring 
Grant,  was  allowed  $350,  and  a  home  in  the  institution.  At 
a  meeting  of  the  trustees,  April  10,  1832,  rules  were  made 
for  the  institution,  a  course  of  study  was  prescribed,  the  prices 
of  board  and  tuition  were  fixed,  and  Dr.  Dempster  hav- 
ing declined,  Samuel  Luckey,  D.D.,  was  urged  to  accept  the 
principalship,  which  he  did,  taking  a  transfer  from  the  New 
York  to  the  Genesee  Conference  for  that  purpose.  All  the 
other  teachers  accepted  the  positions  tendered,  and  reported 
for  duty  at  the  opening  of  the  term.  At  this  meeting  of 
the  board  the  following  announcement  was  issued : 

The  Genesee  Wesley  an  Seminary.  —  This  institution  has  been 
established  in  the  town  of  Lima,  Livingston  County,  N.  Y.,  under  the 
patronage  of  the  Genesee  Annual  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episco- 
pal Church.  Its  original  design  contemplates  instruction  in  letters  and 
science,  combined  with  agriculture  and  the  mechanic  arts.  The  means 
within  reach  of  its  patrons  have  not  as  yet  been  sufficient  to  enable 
them  to  carry  all  these  plans  into  full  operation.  Yet  in  furtherance  of 
these  plans  a  board  of  executive  officers  has  been  constituted.  A  com- 
manding site  and  farm  have  been  secured,  a  commodious  building 
erected,  a  competent  faculty  procured,  a  course  of  study  prescribed, 
by-laws  enacted,  and  arrangements  made  to  open  the  school  on  the  first 


The  Gknesee  Wesley ajj  Seminary.  159 

Wednesday  in  May,  1832.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  add  that  the  prin. 
ciples  which  are  to  govern  and  characterize  the  school  are  perfectly 
liberal;  every  thing  of  a  sectarian  cast  has  been  excluded  from  the  course 
of  instruction. 

The  doors  of  the  Genesee  Weslejan  Seminary  opened  as 
thus  announced,  though  the  building  was  unfinished,  and  but 
partially  furnished.  The  grounds  had  not  yet  been  graded, 
or  the  several  departments  furnished  with  the  needed  facili- 
ties, and  the  trustees  lacked  the  means  to  supply  these  defi- 
ciencies. The  students  found  that  the  accommodations 
were  not  luxurious,  neither  were  the  charges  exorbitant. 
Tuition  in  the  common  English  branches  was  $3,  and  in 
the  higher  branches  $5,  per  quai'ter.  In  the  ladies'  depart- 
ment tuition  was  $3,  and  music  $5,  per  quarter.  Board, 
w^'th  lodging,  washing,  fuel  and  lights,  was  $1  50  per  week. 
Eoom  rent,  $1  50  per  quarter.  These  prices  were  so  low 
that  they  might  suggest  provision  only  for  juveniles.  But 
the  students  during  the  first  year  were  far  from  being  juve- 
niles. They  were  young  people  approaching  man's  estate 
and  womanhood,  and  were  full  of  self-respect. 

At  the  close  of  the  year  the  faculty  reported  that  the  en- 
rollment had  been  three  hundred  and  forty-one — two  hundred 
and  thirty  gentlemen  and  one  hundred  and  eleven  ladies. 
Classes  had  been  instructed  in  universal  geography,  logic, 
elements  of  criticism,  metaphysics,  geometry,  surveying,  nat- 
ural philosophy,  chemistry,  Greek,  Hebrew,  Latin,  rhetoric, 
history,  moral  philosopliy,  natural  theology,  algebra,  conic 
sections,  astronomy,  French,  and  drawing.  During  the  first 
year,  or  at  its  close,  several  changes  occurred  in  the  faculty,  so 
that  at  the  opening  of  the  second  year  the  roll  of  instructors 
stood:  Samuel  Luckey,  D.D.,  principal;  T.  J.  Rugar,  A.B., 
mathematics ;  John  Ilutton,  A.B.,  languages ;  Elisha  Ilyde^ 


160  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

primary  department;  Lord  Sterling,  assistant;  Miss  Eliza 
S.  Eogers,  preceptress ;  Miss  Eliza  Beecher,  assistant ;  Miss 
Caroline  E.  Webber,  teacher  of  music  and  drawing.  Rev. 
Gideon  Laning  and  Rev.  Wilbur  Hoag  were  added  to  the 
list  of  agents.  During  this  year  Professor  Hutton  retired, 
and  Lockwood  Hoyt,  A.M.,  became  professor  of  ancient  and 
modern  languages,  and  literature ;  W.  H.  Goodwin  became 
assistant  in  English ;  William  Pengra  was  steward.  Three 
hundred  and  seventy-six  students  were  enrolled  during  this 
year.  The  first  act  incorporating  the  seminary  was  not  ac- 
ceptable to  the  friends  of  the  school,  but  an  amended  charter, 
granted  early  in  1834,  pleased  all  parties.  It  discontinued 
the  board  of  visitors  as  a  part  of  the  corporation,  and 
increased  the  number  of  trustees  to  thirteen.  In  1834  Dr. 
Luckey  was  permitted  to  be  absent  on  account  of  ill  health, 
and  Professor  Rugar  was  the  acting  principal.  Dr.  Luckey 
finally  retired  in  May,  1836,  to  accept  the  editorship  of 
"The  Christian  Advocate  and  Journal."  Rev.  Schuyler 
Seager,  A.M.,  became  principal  at  the  opening  of  the  term 
in  September,  1837.  During  the  interval  Professor  Hoyt 
performed  the  duties  of  principal.  Steady  progress  and 
marked  improvement  attended  the  institution  through  the 
remainder  of  the  first  decade.  A  few  changes  in  the  faculty 
occurred.  Professor  Rugar  was  succeeded  in  1835  by  John 
Barker  in  the  chair  of  mathematics,  w^ho  acceptably  occupied 
it  until  1839,  when  he  was  called  to  a  professorship  in  Alle- 
gheny College,  and  to  the  vice-presidentship  of  the  institution. 
Rev.  George  C.  Whitlock  succeeded  Mr.  Barker  at  Lima. 
Professor  Hoyt  continued  at  the  head  of  the  department  of 
languages  through  this  decade,  assisted  at  different  times  by 
George  Loomis  and  William  T.  Curtis.  In  March,  1842, 
Rev.  George  Loomis,  A.M.,  succeeded  Daniel  J.  Pinckney, 


The  Genesee  Wesley  an  Seminary.  161 

as  professor  of  natural  science.  Miss  Eogers  resigned  her 
position  as  preceptress  in  1835.  Miss  Tripliena  Holmes  tilled 
the  place  for  one  year,  and  Miss  Maria  Hyde  entered  it  for 
two  years;  Miss  Eogers  then  returned  as  the  wife  of  the 
principal,  Mr.  Seager.  They  both  retired  in  1844.  The 
average  attendance  of  students  during  this  period  was  four 
hundred  and  five.  In  the  early  morning  of  May  26,  1842, 
the  seminary  building  was  discovered  to  be  on  fire.  Its  de- 
struction was  the  work  of  but  an  hour.  No  lives  were  lost, 
and  most  of  the  furniture,  the  apparatus,  and  library  were 
saved.  The  town-hall  was  secured  for  recitation,  the  students 
found  accommodations  in  the  homes  of  the  citizens,  and  the 
school  continued  without  loss  of  time.  The  loss  was  $25,000, 
on  which  there  was  an  insurance  of  $12,000.  The  tire  was 
believed  to  be  incendiary,  but  no  evidence  to  convict  the  sus- 
pected party  came  to  light. 

Four  days  later  the  deliberations  of  the  trustees  were  inter- 
rupted by  the  announcement  that  the  citizens  of  Lima  had, 
in  valid  subscriptions,  raised  the  sum  of  $5,000.  This  at  the 
moment  seemed  like  a  voice  from  Heaven  calling  upon  the 
board  to  go  forward  and  rebuild.  Words  of  encouragement 
came  from  pastors  and  churches  in  all  parts  of  the  Confer- 
ence. Twenty-two  days  later  a  building  committee  was  ap- 
pointed and  a  contract  made  for  the  erection  of  a  new  build- 
ing. Tiie  men  who  founded  this  institution  had  grown  dur- 
ing the  tirst  ten  years  of  its  history.  Their  plans  for  the 
new  editice  were  correspondingly  enlarged. 

The  new  editice  was  to  have  a  frontage  of  one  hundred 
and  forty-four  feet,  with  wings  ninety-six  feet  in  depth  ; 
all  to  be  four  stories  high,  with  basement  interimlly  greatly 
improved.  Sixty  days  after  the  conflagration  the  corner- 
stone of  this  enlarged  building  was  laid.     Rev.  John  Cope- 


162  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

land  made  the  prayer,  and  Principal  Seager  delivered  the 
address.  On  the  12th  of  January,  1843,  the  new  building 
was  opened  ;  Stephen  Olin,  D.D.,  president  of  the  Wesleyan 
University,  delivered  an  elaborate  and  masterly  address, 
which  appears  in  the  second  volume  of  his  published  works. 
To  the  new  and  superior  quarters  provided  the  school  was 
immediately  transferred.  It  entered  npon  its  new  career 
with  Professor  Seagar  as  principal,  and  Mrs.  Seager  as  pi*e- 
ceptress.  Lockwood  Hoyt  continued  teacher  of  languages ; 
George  Loomis,  of  natural  science;  G.  C.  Whitlock,  of 
mathematics ;  and  most  of  the  other  teachers  as  during  the 
former  decade. 

The  trustees  at  this  period  were  Schuyler  Seager,  Thomas 
Carlton,  Asa  Abell,  John  Parker,  Gideon  Draper,  Allen 
Steele,  D.  G.  Shuart,  S.  Dusenberre,  S.  Spencer,  Samuel 
Luckey,  J.  B.  Alverson,  John  Copeland,  and  John  D.  Brown. 
During  the  thirteen  years  including  the  inauguration  of  the 
enterprise,  much  space  has  been  given  to  details,  names  of 
trustees,  officers,  and  teachers.  What  was  done  during  these 
years  had  a  far-reaching  influence.  This  was  the  formative 
period.  The  high  character  which  from  the  first  until  the 
present  day  the  school  has  sustained  is  due  to  the  noble  men 
and  women  who  so  wisely  planned  and  courageously  executed 
for  the  moral  and  intellectual  training  of  its  students. 

In  its  general  tone  and  purposes  it  is  what  they  made  it. 
The  curriculum  and  methods  have  been  kept  up  to  the 
progress  of  the  age,  but  its  spirit  is  the  spirit  of  the  fathers 
and  founders.  Its  true  friends  must  desire  the  dominance  of 
that  spirit  to  the  end. 

During  the  seven  years  from  the  opening  of  the  new 
building  the  seminary  made  satisfactory  progress,  the  high 
average  attendance  of  students  was  four  hundred  and  eighty- 


The  Genesee  Wesley  an  Seminary.  163 

five,  many  of  them  mature  young  ladies  and  gentlemen.  In 
1845  Mr.  and  Mrs.  S eager  vacated  the  positions  of  princi- 
pal and  preceptress.  George  Loomis  and  Miss  Abigail  C. 
Rogers,  the  sister  of  Mrs.  Seager,  were  elected  as  their  suc- 
cessors. They  held  these  positions  for  three  years,  and  were 
followed  by  James  L.  Alverson,  A.M.,  who  for  several  pre- 
ceding years  had  been  a  teacher  in  the  school,  and  Mrs.  Maria 
H.  Hibbard,  who  liad  been  two  years  preceptress  prior  to  her 
marriaire  to  Rev.  Dr.  F.  G.  Hibbard.  There  were  but  few 
changes  among  the  other  teachers  of  this  period.  Stability 
characterized  every  department  of  the  institution. 

Near  the  close  of  the  second  decade  measures  were  taken 
to  organize  Genesee  College  as  a  part  of  the  seminary,  and 
3^et  distinct  in  its  essential  features.  A  charter  was  obtained 
in  1849,  and  within  two  years  a  president  and  professors 
were  secured,  funds  collected,  a  noble  edifice  erected  on 
the  seminary  campus,  a  large  class  of  students  matricu- 
lated, and  a  college  of  high  character  opened.  The  good 
infiuence  of  the  college  upon  the  seminary  was  strikingly 
visible. 

The  attendance  of  students  in  the  seminary  arose  from 
four  hundred  and  forty-four  in  1849,  to  six  hundred  and 
sixty-one  the  next  year,  and  to  one  thousand  and  twenty- 
nine  in  1851,  and  in  1853  there  were  enrolled  in  the  semi- 
nary one  thousand  and  fifty-eight.  The  elevating  influence 
of  the  college  upon  the  scholarship  of  the  seminary  was 
another  marked  feature. 

The  third  decade,  1851,  opened  with  "the  hill"  swarming 
with  students.  The  halls  and  class-rooms  were  full.  The 
public  exercises  of  the  societies,  the  anniversaries  and  com- 
mencements, were  occasions  of  the  greatest  enthusiasm.  Gen- 
erous rivalry  was  visible  in  the  class  and  lecture  rooms,  in  the 


164:  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

essays,  declamations,  and  orations  of  the  students  in  all  de- 
partments. 

In  1851  Mr.  Alverson  was  transferred  from  the  principal- 
ship  of  the  seminary  to  a  professorship  in  the  college.  His 
successors  in  the  seminary  were  Moses  Crow,  for  three  years ; 
then  for  two  years  Dr.  Sclmyler  Seager,  who  was  followed 
by  C.  W.  Bennett ;  then  C.  R  Pomeroy  and  Zenas  Hurd. 
Mrs.  Hibbard  retired  in  1851 ;  Miss  Maria  Kelley  then 
filled  the  place  for  two  years,  followed  by  Miss  Elizabeth  N". 
Lapham,  for  eight  years.  At  this  period  Rev.  John  Dennis 
was  agent  and  treasurer  of  the  college,  and  had  charge  of  the 
financial  interests  of  the  seminary.  The  average  enrollment 
in  the  seminary  for  the  third  decade  was  eight  hundred  and 
eleven  per  annum. 

The  agitation  of  the  question  of  removing  the  college 
eastward  to  a  more  central  location  had  a  depressing  influ- 
ence upon  both  institutions,  which  was  marked  by  decreasing 
numbers,  and  the  loss  of  the  enthusiasm  of  former  years. 
When,  in  1871,  the  college  ceased  its  functions  at  Lima — it  was 
not  removed — the-seminary  was  staggering  under  the  burden 
of  indifference,  neglect,  and  bitterness,  engendered  under  the 
influence  of  the  attempted  removal  of  the  college.  The  nar- 
row limits  allowed  to  this  chapter  will  permit  only  the  brief- 
est reference  to  the  later  years  of  the  seminary.  The  average 
enrollment  between  1871  and  1881  was  three  hundred  and 
thirty-six.  From  1802  to  1872  the  principalship  was  tilled 
by  Professor  William  Wells,  now  of  Union  College ;  C.  W. 
Bennett,  Spencer  R  Fuller,  and  Herbert  F.  Fisk,  now  of  the 
North-western  University.  Miss  Hannah  Case,  Frances  E. 
Willard,  Mrs.  ^Y.  C.  Scylla,  Emma  L.  Waite,  and  Mrs.  Mary 
E.  Stone  were  successively  in  charge  of  the  ladies'  department. 
W.  P.  Coddington,  of  the  Syracuse  University ;  Charles  G. 


The  Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminaey.  165 

Hudson ;  S.  A.  Latimore,  of  Rochester  University ;  James  H. 
Hoose  and  George  H.  Bangs  were  teacliers  in  mathematics, 
natural  science,  and  languages.  In  1872  George  H.  Bridg- 
man  became  principal,  and  Miss  Elizabeth  Button  preceptress. 
W.  E.  Thompson,  A.M.,  became  teaclier  in  languages  ;  Adam 
C.  Works,  A.M.,  mathematics  and  natural  science  ;  and  Mar- 
Bena  E.  Pierce  and  Abby  Barry,  teachei*s  of  English.  Miss 
Pierce,  now  Mrs.  W.  E.  Thompson,  retired  at  the  end  of  two 
years,  when  Miss  Emma  Terry  was  elected  to  fill  her  place. 
Miss  Button  resigned,  after  eight  years  of  good  service,  and 
became  Mrs.  E.  T.  Green,  and  Mrs.  Anna  E.  Eice  took  and 
still  fills  her  place.  Miss  Barry  retired  in  1884,  and  her  suc- 
cessor is  Rev.  J.  L.  Davies,  of  the  Genesee  Conference.  Called 
to  the  presidency  of  Hamline  University,  Mr.  Bridgman  re- 
signed the  principalship,  having,  with  ability,  held  the  office 
ten  years.  W.  G.  Williams  nominally  held  the  office  of  prin- 
cipal for  two  years,  but  rendered  only  two  terms  of  actual 
service.  Professors  Works  and  Thompson  did  the  work  of 
that  department.  In  June,  1885,  Rev.  J.  D.  Phelps,  A.M., 
late  of  the  Cazenovia  Seminary,  was  elected  principal,  and  is 
now  performing  the  duties  of  his  office.  The  other  teachers 
are  A.  E.  Colgrove,  A.M.,  Mary  A.  Nash,  W.  A.  Putnam, 
Herve  D.  Wilkins,  A.M.,  and  Nellie  M.  Lake.  The  present 
board  of  trustees  are  C.  W.  Winchester,  M.  C.  Dean,  O.  S. 
Chamberlayne,  Alfred  Wright,  George  H.  Dryer,  E.  H.  Lat- 
imer, A.  J.  Lorrish,  John  Dennis,  L.  T.  Foot,  Sandford  Hunt, 
J.  E.  Bills,  Edmund  Ocumpaugh,  Eli  Taylor,  A.  N.  Fisher, 
T.  J.  Bissell,  L.  A.  Stevens,  C.  E.  Millspaugh,  Horace  Gil- 
bert. E.  Ocumpaugh  is  president,  L.  T.  Foot  secretary, 
and  J.  E.  Bills  treasurer.  In  concluding  this  brief  sketch 
many  things  press  for  attention.  The  semi-centennial  of  the 
institution,  celebrated  in  1880,  was  an  occasion  of  extraordi- 


166  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

narj  interest  and  enthusiasm.  In  1875  Dr.  Bridgman  raised 
$17,000,  and  $5,000  has  been  raised  since.  These  amounts 
were  expended  in  introducing  steam  for  heating  purposes, 
and  in  repairing  and  refurnishing  the  property.  During 
the  summer  of  1885,  under  the  leadership  of  Mr.  Alfred 
"Wright,  of  Eochester,  the  buildings  were  again  thoroughly 
overhauled  and  put  in  better  condition  tlian  they  ever  were 
before.  The  rooms  were  never  before  so  comfortably  and 
elegantly  furnished.  The  endowment  consists  of  a  productive 
farm,  and  of  $65,000  invested  upon  bonds  and  mortgages. 

Tliis  institution  has  had  a  remarkable  history ;  the  impres- 
sion that  it  has  made  upon  the  ministry,  the  Church,  and 
upon  the  lives  of  thousands  in  general  society,  has  been  pro- 
found and  permanent.  Some  of  the  factors  contributing  to 
its  successful  career  are  worthy  of  consideration.  In  the  first 
place,  it  has  been  a  Christian  school.  A  religious  spirit, 
profound  and  positive,  has  pervaded  it.  The  fundamentals 
of  the  Christian  system  have  been  held  without  wavering. 
Revivals  have  been  the  order  from  the  first.  No  year, 
scarcely  a  term,  has  passed  that  did  not  record  conversions 
among  the  students  in  greater  or  less  numbers — as  many  as 
seventy-five  in  a  single  term  having  been  saved.  Scores  who 
have  found  Christ  as  a  personal  Saviour  have  entered  the 
ministry.  God's  blessing  has  been  and  will  be  on  a  school 
where  such  work  is  done.  The  scholarship  system  has 
aided  the  seminary.  Said  Eev.  Dr.  Dennis,  at  the  semi- 
centennial celebration : 

One  peculiar  feature  in  the  founding  of  Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary, 
and  later  of  Genesee  College,  was  the  scholarship  basis,  by  which  these 
institutions  covenanted,  in  consideration  of  one  hundred  dollars,  to 
give  fre  etuition  for  one  student,  in  the  solid  branches,  either  in  the 
seminary  or  college,  in  perpetuity.     The  scholarship  system  brought 


The  Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary.  167 

into  union  and  sympathy  with  the  new  institution  a  thousand  families. 
These  thought  and  talked,  and  many  of  them  prated,  for  the  Genesee 
Wesleyan  Seminary,  and  later  for  Genesee  College.  Almost  every 
scholarship  holder  regarded  it  as  a  duty  to  use  these  scholarships  that 
no  interest  might  be  lost.  Many  sons  and  daughters  of  these,  from  the 
mountains  and  valleys  of  Northern  Pennsylvania  and  Southern  New 
York,  came  to  Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary  and  Genesee  College,  who 
otherwise  never  would  have  entered  an  institution  of  higher  education, 
and  laid  broad  and  deep  the  foundations  of  a  liberal  education. 

There  is  space  for  allusion  to  but  one  other  element  of 
power  among  the  many  that  challenge  attention  in  this 
movement,  and  that  is  the  ability  and  character  of  those  who 
have  occupied  the  position  of  teachers.  Many  of  their 
names  are  written  on  these  pages ;  there  is  no  occasion  to 
repeat  them.  They  are  as  familiar,  not  only  to  the  Method- 
ist but  to  the  general  public,  as  household  words.  Where 
they  are  generally  of  so  high  an  order  I  have  not  trusted 
myself  to  distinguish.  I  may  be  permitted  to  say,  perhaps, 
that  it  may  be  doubted  if  any  other  institution  of  equal  grade 
can  present  an  array  of  names  of  equal  ability  and  distinc- 
tion. I  will  present  my  own  estimate  of  them  in  the  Ian. 
guage  of  Hon.  Angus  Cameron,  United  States  Senator  from 
Wisconsin,  and  a  former  student,  in  a  letter  to  Dr.  Bridg- 
man,  at  the  time  of  the  semi-centennial  celebration.  After 
expressing  his  regret  that  Congress  would  not  adjourn  in 
time  for  him  to  be  present,  and  indulging  in  many  reminis- 
cences, he  says :  "  The  scliool  was  then  strong  in  its  faculty, 
and  the  number  and  character  of  its  students.  I  have  been 
acquainted  since  with  college  faculties,  and  have  been  present 
at  college  commencements,  but  I  have  never  known  a  faculty 
that,  in  ability  and  scholarship,  exceeded  that  of  the  Genesee 
AVesleyan  Seminary  in  the  years  1847,  '48,  '49,  nor  have  I 
ever  seen  college  students  which,  as  a  whole,  were  superior  to 


168  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

tlie  students  of  yonr  seminary  at  that  time."  One  might 
well  cover  the  space  to  speak  of  the  students  that  this  insti- 
tution has  sent  forth ;  twenty-seven  thousand  of  them  edu- 
cated, in  part  or  wholly,  within  its  class  rooms.  Hundreds 
of  them  in  the  front  ranks  of  Church  and  State.  So  many 
of  them  that  are  worthy  of  mention  that  one  hesitates  in  dis- 
tinguishing between  them.  Henry  J.  Raymond,  Orange 
Judd,  W.  H.  De  Puy,  D.D.,  Eleazer  Thomas,  D.D.,  J.  H. 
Bayliss,  D.D.,  and  S.  H.  Lowe,  in  journalism.  Senator  An- 
gus Cameron,  Judge  J^oah  Davis,  Hon.  C.  G.  Williams,  Judge 
John  S.  Morgan,  William  F.  Cogswell,  Hon.  John  Yan  Yoor- 
liees,  and  Judge  S.  Hubbard,  in  law.  Bishop  C.  H.  Fowler, 
A.  C.  George,  D.  W.  Huntley,  K.  P.  Jervis,  and  a  great 
list  of  others  equally  deserving  of  mention,  in  the  pulpit. 
S.  S.  Welles,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  L.  H.  Bugbee,  D.D.,  James  L. 
Alverson,  LL.D.,  George  Loomis,  D.D.,  C.  W.  Bennett,  D.D., 
D.  P.  Kidder,  D.D.,  J.  Dorman  Steele,  and  Jabez  R.  Jaques, 
D.D.,  among  the  educators.  Mrs.  J.  Ellen  Foster,  Mrs.  Belva 
Lockwood,  Mrs.  J.  H.  Vincent,  Mrs.  Mary  Seager  Hurd, 
Mrs.  Sarah  Pierson  Wals worth,  and  Mary  Northrup  Yan 
Benschoten,  among  the  thousands  of  noble  women  who  have 
honored  their  alma  mater  in  the  most  conspicuous  walks  of 
life.  And  yet  these  names  are  but  suggestive  of  the  list  that 
might  be  made,  solid  men  and  women,  not  all  of  them  of 
equal  prominence,  but  many  of  them  in  the  widest  fields  of 
usefulness. 

This  chapter  cannot  be  more  appropriately  closed  than 
by  quoting  again  from  Senator  Cameron's  letter,  where  he 
says :  **  The  Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary  has  for  fifty  years 
been  a  nursery  of  sound  orthodox  religion  and  education. 
No  man  can  measure  its  influence ;  its  students  are  in  every 
professsion,  and  in  all  occupations,  and  in  every  land." 


Wesleyan  Univebsity.  169 


CHAPTER  YI. 

WESLBYAN    UNIVERSITY. 

BY   EDWARD   COOKE,    D.D. 

Perhaps  no  institution  of  learning  in  this  country  possesses 
greater  advantages  of  location  than  Wesleyan  University,  at 
Middletown,  Conn.  Beautiful  for  situation,  on  the  banks  of 
the  Connecticut,  extending  from  the  water's  edge  up  the  ter, 
races  westward  to  a  height  of  about  one  hundred  and  fifty 
feet  above  the  river,  Middletown  presents  some  of  the  most 
enchanting  scenery  to  be  found  anywhere  in  that  far-famed 
Xew  England  valley.  The  place  was  fii-st  settled  in  1650; 
organized  as  a  town,  under  the  good  old  Puritan  code,  in 
1653,  taking  the  name  which  it  still  bears ;  chartered  as  a  city 
in  1784,  the  same  year  with  Hartford  and  New  Haven,  and 
thirty-eight  years  earlier  than  Boston.  It  is  easily  reached 
by  rail  from  all  directions,  and  from  New  York  and  Hartford 
by  steamers. 

The  site  on  which  the  university  buildings  stand,  contain- 
ing about  twenty  acres,  is  on-  one  of  the  highest  and  most 
beautiful  streets  of  the  city.  It  was  chosen,  and  the  first  build- 
ings erected,  for  "  The  American  Literary,  Scientific,  and  Mil- 
itary Academy,"  under  the  direction  of  the  noted  Captain 
Alden  Partridge,  an  early  superintendent  of  the  Military 
Academy  at  West  Point.  The  academy  was  auspiciously 
opened  in  1825,  though  not  then  chartered  by  tlie  State  of 
Connecticut,  and  at  the  close  of  the  first  year  numbered 
twenty  officers  and  instructors  and  two  hundred  and  seventy- 
two  cadets. 
8 


170  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Failing  to  receive  a  charter  from  the  General  Assembly 
of  Connecticut,  with  the  privileges  asked  by  the  trustees, 
tlie  academy  was  abandoned,  and  Captain  Partridge  estab- 
lished a  similar  institution  at  Norwich,  Vermont,  to  which 
place  he  removed  in  1829.  The  two  four-story  stone  build- 
ings, plain  but  imposing  in  appearance,  erected  by  the  liber- 
ality of  the  citizens  of  Middletown,  w^ere  left  standing  unoc- 
cupied. Several  attempts  had  been  made  to  establish  col- 
leges under  Methodist  control,  but  they  had  proved  so 
many  failures.  Cokesbury,  Asbury,  and  Madison  Colleges 
all  had  but  a  brief  existence.  Augusta  College,  in  Kentucky, 
was  the  first  successful  attempt ;  this  had  a  brilliant  history 
for  a  few  years. 

Leading  men  in  Methodism,  both  in  the  ministry  and  laity, 
in  New  York  and  ISTew  England,  began  to  feel  that  the  time 
had  fully  come  to  establish  a  college  or  university  at  some 
central  point  in  one  of  these  two  sections,  with  an  endow- 
ment that  would  at  once  secure  for  it  a  recognition  among 
the  first  of  its  class.  Seminaries  of  a  higher  grg,de  had  for 
some  years  been  in  successful  operation  at  Keadfield,  Maine  ; 
Wilbraham,  Mass. ;  and  Cazenovia,  N.  Y. ;  but  no  provision 
had  been  made  for  completing  the  education  thus  begun. 
Just  at  this  crisis  Kev.  Laban  Clark,  D.D.,  presiding  elder 
of  the  district  including  Middletown,  learning  tliat  the  Mil- 
itary Academy  was  soon  to  be  removed  to  Yermont,  and  tliat 
the  trustees  would  sell  the  property  at  a  very  low  figure  for 
a  Methodist  college,  saw  a  "  tide  in  the  affairs  of  men  "  which 
would  prove  a  fortune  to  Methodism  at  least,  if  "  taken  at 
the  flood,"  and  presented  the  subject  to  the  New  York  Con- 
ference, which  assembled  in  May,  1829.  This  body  enter- 
t«nined  the  matter  with  favor,  and  appointed  Kevs.  John 
Emory,  Samuel  Luckey,  and  Hemau  Bangs  a  committee  of 


Wesley  AN  University.  171 

inquiry.  Tliis  committee  reported  favorably,  and  recom- 
mended that  the  New  England  Conference  be  invited  to 
join  with  the  New  York  Conference  in  purchasing  the  prop- 
erty at  Middletown,  and  establishing  the  proposed  college. 
The  New  England  Conference,  which  met  a  few  weeks  later, 
received  the  proposition  with  much  favor,  and  appointed,  as  a 
committee  to  co-operate  with  those  appointed  by  the  New 
York  Conference,  three  of  its  most  influential  members, 
Revs.  Wilbur  Fisk,  D.D.,  then  principal  of  Wesleyan  Acad- 
emy at  Wilbraham,  Mass.,  Timothy  Merritt,  and  Stephen 
Martindale.  This  joint  committee  met  soon  after,  and  in- 
vited competitive  offers  from  towns  and  cities  within  certain 
prescribed  bounds.  Generous  offers  were  received  from 
Bridgeport  and  Middletown,  Conn. ;  Wilbraham,  Mass. ; 
and  Troy,  N.  Y.  The  trustees  of  the  Military  Academy 
offered  to  transfer  that  property,  in  fee  simple,  on  condi- 
tions, first,  that  $40,000  be  raised  within  a  s^jecified  time,  as 
the  beginning  of  an  endowment ;  and,  second,  that  the  prop- 
erty conveyed  should  be  used  in  perpetuity  for  a  college  or 
university. 

The  citizens  of  Middletown  promptly  subscribed  $18,000 
of  the  $40,000,  and  the  Conferences,  meeting  in  the  spring  of 
1830,  decided  to  locate  the  institution  at  Middletown,  and 
took  steps  to  close  the  contract  and  to  raise  the  balance  of 
the  required  endowment.  To  exercise  the  governing  control 
until  a  charter  should  be  secured  from  the  General  Assembly 
of  Connecticut  a  prudential  committee  was  appointed,  and 
twenty-one  individuals,  residing  in  New  York  and  New  En- 
gland, were  named  as  the  choice  for  the  first  board  of  trustees. 
By  act  of  May,  1831,  the  persons  thus  named  were  duly 
incorporated  as  Wesleyan  University.  The  charter  also  pro- 
vided for  a  joint  board,  comprised  of  the  trustees  and  an 


172  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

equal  number  of  visitors  to  be  appointed  by  the  "  patroniz- 
ing Conferences"  and  a  prudential  committee,  with  certain 
powers,  who  should  act  in  the  interim  of  the  meetings  of  the 
joint  board.  This  machinery  was  found  too  unwieldy  in 
practice,  and  about  forty  years  later  (1870)  the  charter  under- 
went a  revision.  The  powers  of  the  joint  board  were  con- 
ferred upon  a  single  board  of  trustees,  to  be  elected,  a  part 
by  the  trustees,  a  part  by  the  Conferences,  and  a  part  hy  the 
alumni  association  of  the  college. 

The  first  meeting  of  the  trustees  and  Conference  visitors 
was  held  at  Middletown,  August  24,  1830,  and  had  been 
awaited  with  intense  interest  by  the  Methodist  public.  A 
great  enterprise  had  been  undertaken,  and  much  depended 
upon  the  action  taken  at  this  first  meeting.  Methodist  col- 
leges had  previously  not  been  successful,  and  there  were 
not  a  few  good  men  in  the  Church  who  still  believed  "  God 
did  not  call  the  Methodists  to  build  colleges." 

Twenty  of  the  twenty- one  trustees  and  twelve  of  the 
twenty-one  Conference  visitors  were  present  at  this  meeting. 
Tliey  were  men  of  years,  of  experience,  earnest,  and  God-fear- 
ing. They  sought  wisdom  from  on  high  for  the  work  before 
them,  and  the  results  indicate  that  the  petition  was  answered. 
The  most  responsible  as  well  as  the  most  delicate  act  to  be 
performed  was  to  select  the  right  man  for  the  presidential 
chair.  The  whole  field  of  Methodism,  in  Europe  and  Amer- 
ica, was  examined.  Dr.  Adam  Clarke,  Dr.  Jabez  Bunting, 
and  other  names  of  British  Methodist  ministers  were  talked 
of  for  the  position.  But  before  the  meeting  adjourned  all 
thoughts  came  back  to  the  choice,  first  and  last,  of  those  vet- 
erans Laban  Clark  and  Heman  Bangs  to  a  member  of  the 
board  of  trustees  then  present,  but  not  a  candidate  by  any 
act  or  word  on  his  part.    The  ballot  was  taken,  and  the  Rev. 


WeSLEYAN   IlNn^ERSITY.  1^3 

Wilbur  Fisk,  D.D.,  was  chosen  the  first  president  of  Wes- 
ley an  University. 

Dr.  Fisk  had  already  become  widely  known  as  the  recog- 
nized educational  leader  in  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church; 
a  superior  organizer,  a  clear  thinker,  and  an  eloquent  pulpit 
orator.  East,  west,  north,  and  south,  all  felt  that  the  right 
man  was  chosen  for  the  responsible  position. 

Dr.  Fisk  was  born  at  Brattleboro,  Yt.,  August  31,  1792, 
having  descended  from  the  good  old  Puritan  stock.  He 
gave  early  evidence  of  great  vigor  of  intellect.  He  pre- 
pared for  college  at  the  academy  in  Peacham,  and  entered 
the  university  at  Burlington  in  1812.  But  the  war  with 
Great  Britain  caused  the  classes  to  be  suspended  the  next 
year,  and  he  repaired  to  Brown  University,  entering  as  jun- 
ior, and  was  graduated  with  honors  in  1815.  The  law  was  his 
chosen  profession,  but  yielding  to  the  pressure  of  his  strong 
convictions  of  duty,  he  exchanged  the  bar  for  the  pulpit,  after 
having  prepared  for  admission  to  practice,  and  chose  as  the 
field  of  his  ministerial  labor  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 
This  decision  caused  him  a  severe  struggle,  and  brought  forth 
stern  remonstrances  from  friends,  who  said,  *•  To  bury  his 
brilliant  talents  in  the  Methodist  connection  was  a  sacrifice 
which  he  was  not  called  to  make;"  but  he  felt  a  firm  convic- 
tion that  he  had  a  work  to  accomplish  in  that  Church,  and 
no  mere  worldly  considerations  could  turn  him  aside  from 
what  he  felt  to  be  duty.  And  now,  when  the  results  of  his 
devotion  to  the  cause  of  higher  education  are  before  the 
world,  who  can  doubt  that  the  liand  of  God  directed  his 
clioice?  He  was  received  into  the  New  England  Conference 
in  tlie  spring  of  1818,  and  for  the  next  three  years  devoted 
himself  to  pastoral  and  pulpit  labor,  in  which  field  he  at 
once  attracted  much  public  attention  by  his  superior  abilities 


174  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

as  an  orator.  In  consequence  of  impaired  liealtli  he  was 
now  obliged  to  have  entire  rest  from  all  public  efforts,  and 
was  for  two  years  returned  on  the  Minutes  of  Conference  as 
a  superannuate.  Having  enjoyed  the  quiet  of  his  paternal 
home,  with  out-door  exercise,  and  freedom  from  all  care  dur- 
ing these  two  years,  he  was  anxious  to  resume  again  his 
chosen  labor,  and,  young  as  he  was,  the  Bishop  appointed 
him,  at  the  Conference  in  1823,  the  presiding  elder  on  the 
Vermont  District,  which  included  the  whole  State  east  of  the 
Green  Mountains  and  one  circuit  in  New  Hampshire.  Tliis 
large  field  must  be  traversed  four  times  a  year  on  horseback. 
The  duties  of  this  laborious  office  he  discharged  with  improv- 
ing health  and  increasing  popularity  till  he  removed  to  Wil- 
braham,  Mass.,  in  May,  1826,  having  sometime  previously 
been  elected  principal  of  Wesley  an  Academy.  In  this  posi- 
tion he  remained  five  years,  exercising  those  gifts  possessed 
by  him  in  an  unusual  degree  as  an  organizer,  educator,  and 
skillful  disciplinarian.  These  qualities,  so  marked,  brought 
offers  of  the  presidency  of  one  State  University  of  high 
standing,  and  chairs  in  several  colleges,  all  of  which  he 
declined  till  elected  to  the  proposed  university  at  Middle- 
town,  as  previously  narrated.  This  last  election  he  regarded 
as  a  call  from  Heaven.  Twice  was  he  elected  a  Bishop,  once 
for  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  of  Canada,  and,  eight 
years  later,  in  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  but  his  con- 
victions remained  unchanged,  that  duty  required  him  to  re- 
main at  the  university,  and,  true  to  duty  as  the  needle  to  the 
pole,  there  he  remained  till  called  to  his  reward  above. 

The  joint  board,  at  this  first  meeting,  provided  for  opening 
at  Middletown  a  preparatory  school,  and  appointed  agents  to 
solicit  donations  and  sell  scholarships  entitling  the  holder  to 
free  tuition.     The  preparatory  classes  commenced  their  work 


Wesley  AN  University.  175 

in  October,  1830,  under  Rev.  William  C.  Larrabee,  A.B.,  aii 
alumnus  of  Bowdoin  College,  as  principal.  Mr.  Larrabee 
subsequently  became  noted  as  a  scholar  and  successful  edu- 
cator, and  is  remembered  with  affection  by  thousands  once 
his  pupils. 

The  university  proper  opened  September  21,  1831,  with 
the  following  faculty  the  first  year:  Rev.  Wilbur  Fisk, 
S.T.D.,  president ;  Augustus  William  Smith,  A.M.,  professor 
of  mathematics ;  Rev.  John  Mott  Smith,  A.  M.,  professor  of 
ancient  languages;  Rev.  Jacob  F.  Iluber,  A.M.,  professor  of 
modern  languages;  William  Magoun,  A.M.,  tutor. 

During  the  lirst  term  forty-eight  students  were  matricu- 
lated, several  of  tliem  coming  from  other  colleges,  drawn, 
probably,  by  denominational  preferences.  The  first  who  ma- 
triculated was  destined  to  fill  no  small  place  in  the  Church 
of  his  choice.  Converted  while  a  student  at  Wesleyan 
Academy,  and  received  on  probation  by  Dr.  Fisk  at  the  age 
of  fifteen,  he  filled  the  various  offices  of  the  Church,  from 
that  of  an  exhorter,  at  seventeen  years  of  age,  to  that  of 
Bishop  in  1852.  Osmon  Cleander  Baker  left  college  during 
his  senior  year,  compelled  by  ill  health  ;  but  his  name  heads 
the  list  of  honored  non-graduate  alumni  of  his  alma  mater. 
The  first  to  recite  a  lesson  in  college  was  Elishu  Bourna  Kye, 
wlio  was  graduated  in  1835,  studied  medicine  at  New  Haven, 
practiced  in  Middletown,  and  1ms  made  a  good  record  as  a 
physician. 

The  first  commencement  was  held  August  28,  1833,  and 
six  young  men  received  the  baccalaureate  degree.  Daniel  H. 
Chase  (still  living),  Benjamin  I.  Diefendorf,  William  Golicar, 
John  Roper,  George  II.  Rounds,  and  Alexander  II.  Wright 
will  stand  as  the  pioneers  of  the  large  and  increasing  number 
of  alum7ii.     Six  under-graduates  also  delivered  addresses  to 


1Y6  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

fill  up  the  time.  Aiiotlier  item  of  some  moment  at  this  first 
commencement  is  the  fact  that  the  subsequently  distin- 
guished Daniel  Denison  Whedon,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  delivered  his 
inaugural  as  professor  of  ancient  classics,  successor  to  John 
Mott  Smith,  deceased. 

It  would  be  a  pleasing  task  to  narrate  the  works  and  lives 
of  these  six  pioneer  graduates,  now  that  all  but  one  have 
passed  beyond  this  life,  and  record  what  they  accomplislied 
for  the  Church  and  the  world ;  but  the  space  allotted  to  this 
article  forbids.  We  can,  therefore,  only  refer  the  reader  to 
what  may  be  found  in  the  "  Alumni  Record."  We  have  thus 
far  traced  the  inception  and  progress  until  we  have  seen  the 
university  launched  on  the  tide  of  success,  its  classes  and 
faculty  fully  organized,  and  its  first  class  graduated.  We 
now  come  to  its  further  develt>pment  and  growth.  Two 
measures,  then  innovations  upon  college  usages,  were,  upon 
the  recommendation  of  President  Fisk,  adopted  b}^  the  uni- 
versity. The  first  was,  to  pass  students  and  admit  them  to  a 
degree  whenever  they  could  successfully  stand  the  required 
examination,  without  regard  to  time.  To  facilitate  this  the 
students  were  divided  into  sections  or  departments  of  study, 
instead  of  the  usual  four  classes,  freshmen,  sophomore,  junior, 
and  senior.  This  plan,  however,  did  not  long  remain  in 
force,  and  there  was  a  return  to  the  usual  classification.  The 
other  innovation  was  that  of  a  purely  scientific  course  of 
study,  securing  the  degree  of  bachelor  of  science.  This 
still  remains  in  use,  and  the  plan  has  been  adopted  by  a 
large  portion  of  the  colleges  and  universities  of  the  country. 
Dr.  risk  was  spared  to  the  university  nearly  nine  years,  most 
of  the  time  an  invalid,  but  his  services  were  invaluable. 
Before  his  lamented  death,  February  22, 1.839,  much  progress 
had  been  made  in  building  up  and  enlarging  the  foundations 


Wesleyan  University.  177 

of  tlie  university.  The  Endowment  Fund  had  been  increased, 
a  respectable  library  had  been  secured,  a  good  working  appa- 
ratus had  been  added,  and,  not  least,  the  love  and  confidence 
of  the  Methodist  people  had  been  gained  for  the  institution  in 
all  parts  of  the  country.  Six  regular  classes  had  graduated, 
afirofreoratinff  one  hundred  and  fifteen,  each  of  whom  went  out 

OCT         O  O  ' 

ready  to  promote,  as  far  as  able,  the  interests  of  his  alma 
mater.  A  large  majority  of  those  engaged  in  teaching, 
many  entered  the  clerical  profession,  others  that  of  law  or 
medicine,  and  some  active  business  pursuits. 

"  In  its  early  days  of  poverty,"  says  Professor  Kice,*  "  the 
institution  had  many  faitiiful  and  earnest  friends,  among 
whom  Dr.  Laban  Clark  and  Eev.  Heman  Bangs  are  worthy 
of  special  mention ;  but  to  no  one  was  it  so  deeply  indebted 
as  to  its  president,  Dr.  Wilbur  Fisk.  IJis  pure  and  lofty 
piety,  and  his  gentle  and  winning  manners,  endeared  him  to 
all  who  knew  him ;  while  his  tact  and  prudence,  his  high 
administrative  ability,  his  thorough  culture  and  extensive 
reputation,  and  his  untiring  efforts  in  behalf  of  the  univer- 
sity, soon  assured  its  success,  and  secured  for  it  general  rec- 
ognition." 

When  the  long-dreaded  event  came,  and  the  presidency 
was  really  vacant,  all  felt  how  difficult  it  would  be  to  find  a 
successor.  To  the  professors,  expressing  their  feai's  to  liim 
on  this  subject  just  before  his  death,  his  answer  was,  "  It  will 
1x3  easy  to  find  another  president,  but  not  so  easy  to  find 
another  father." 

At  the  meeting  of  the  joint  board,  August  6,  1839,  Rev. 
Stephen  Olin,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  was  elected  president.  Dr.  Olin 
was  a  native  of  Vermont,  born  March  2,  1797,  at  Leicester, 
Addison  County,  was  an  alum.nu8  of  Middlebury  College,  had 

♦"Scribner's  Monthly,"  Septomlior,  1876, 
8*  


1Y8  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

spent  most  of  liis  years  siiKje  graduation  in  South  Carolina 
and  Georgia,  either  in  educational  institutions  or  in  the  pul- 
pit, in  both  of  which  he  had  acquired  much  renown.  Princi- 
pal of  the  Conference  Seminary  in  South  Carolina,  professor 
of  English  literature  in  the  university  at  Athens,  Georgia, 
and  president  of  Randolph  Macon  College,  in  Virginia,  he 
would  come  no  stranger  to  the  duties  required  as  the  success- 
or of  the  lamented  Fisk.  Dr.  Olin  was  at  this  time  on  liis 
travels  through  Europe,  Egypt,  Petrea,  and  the  Holy  Land, 
in  search  of  health.  Professor  Augustus  W.  Smith,  wlio 
had,  since  the  death  of  Dr.  Fisk,  disci larged  the  duties  of 
president,  was  requested  by  the  board  to  continue  to  act  in 
that  capacity  until  the  return  of  Dr.  Olin,  who  would  then, 
it  was  expected,  assume  the  presidential  chair.  But  on  his 
arrival,  contrary  to  what  had  been  fondly  hoped,  lie  found 
his  health  utterly  insufficient  for  the  duties  of  the  office,  and 
on  February  20,  1841,  tendered  his  resignation,  which  was 
very  reluctantly  accepted  by  the  board.  In  this  emergency 
another  president  must  be  sought,  and  the  choice  fell  upon 
the  venerable  Dr.  Kathan  Bangs.  Few  men,  if  any,  in  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  have  rendered  more  useful 
service  than  he.  A  profound  thinker,  an  able  preacher,  with 
vast  stores  of  knowledge  in  different  departments  of  learn- 
ing, still  Dr.  Bangs  realized  his  want  of  adaptation  to  the 
peculiar  duties  of  the  presidency  of  a  college.  Knowing  but 
little  of  the  student  life  in  the  schools,  he  found  the  position 
not  in  keeping  with  his  own  convictions  of  duty,  and  re- 
signed at  the  close  of  the  year,  August  2,  1842. 

In  the  meantime  the  university  had  been  steadily  advanc- 
ing, the  classes  of  '40,  '41,  and  '42  being  larger  than  those 
that  preceded.  Improvements  had  been  made  in  and 
around  the  buildings ;  the  campus  had  been  set  with  trees 


Wesleyan  University.  170 

and  otherwise  beautified,  and  halls  provided  for  the  literary 
societies.  A  period  of  rest  among  his  native  hills  had  so  far 
restored  Dr.  Olin's  physical  vigor  that  it  was  thought,  both 
by  himself  and  friends,  that  he  might  undertake  the  duties 
of  the  presidency.  He  was,  therefore,  re-elected,  August  2, 
1842,  president  of  Wesleyan  University.  Prof.  William  Nortli 
Eice,  Ph.D.,  in  "Scribner's  Monthly,'' September,  1876,  says, 
"Dr.  Olin's  fame  as  a  pulpit  orator,  and  his  previous  success 
in  similar  institutions,  caused  him  to  be  greeted  with  an  en- 
thusiastic welcome.  His  health  was  so  feeble  as  never  to 
allow  him  to  devote  himself  as  he  wished  to  the  work  of 
instruction.  He  w^as,  however,  successful  in  improving  the 
financial  condition  of  the  university,  and  especially  in  extend- 
ing its  reputation,  and  his  noble  and  commanding  character 
was  itself  an  inspiration  to  all  the  students  under  his  charge." 
President  Olin  was  spared  to  the  university  nine  years 
and  died,  August  16,  1851.  His  remains  were  interred  in 
the  college  cemetery,  where  repose  the  dust  of  the  first 
president.  Fisk  and  Olin  lie  in  the  same  lovely  spot, 
loved  in  life  and  greatly  lamented  in  death  by  all  who  had 
known  them.  There  were  many  points  of  coincidence  in 
the  history  of  these  great  men.  Both  were  born  in  Yer- 
niont,  not  remote  from  each  other,  and  were  sons  of  men 
who  had  acquired  distinction,  and  sat  as  judges  upon  the 
bench ;  both  taught  for  a  short  time  after  graduation,  and 
then  were  impelled,  by  their  own  convictions,  into  the  minis- 
try, and  became  distinguished  as  pulpit  orators.  Both  were 
called  to  educational  institutions  in  which  they  achieved 
marked  success,  and  finished  their  eminently  useful  lives  in 
the  same  official  station,  died  in  the  same  room,  and  now  lie 
side  by  side  in  the  repose  of  death.  Notwithstanding  these 
similarities,  they  were   very  unlike  each  other,  and  unlike 


180  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

other  men.  Each  had  his  points  of  greatest  excellence  and 
greatest  power,  and  they  cannot  be  compared  without  injus- 
tice to  both,  any  more  than  could  Cicero  and  Demosthenes ; 
nor  was  either  deficient  in  the  qualities  in  which  the  other 
most  excelled. 

After  the  death  of  Dr.  Olin,  Pi  of.  A.  W.  Smith  again 
acted  as  president,  •  and  at  the  meeting  of  the  joint  board, 
August  3,  1842,  was  regularly  elected  president  of  Wes- 
leyan  University.  Dr.  Smith  was  a  native  of  Herkimer  Coun- 
ty, 'N.  Y.,  was  graduated  at  Hamilton  College  in  1825,  and 
soon  after  became  a  teacher  in  the  seminary  at  Cazenovia. 
On  the  retirement  of  Nathaniel  Porter,  the  first  principal,  in 
1827,  he  was  elected  to  succeed  him  as  principal,  the  duties 
of  which  office  he  continued  to  perform  with  great  accept- 
ance till  called  to  fill  the  chair  of  mathematics  and  astron- 
omy at  the  opening  of  Wesleyan  University  in  183L.  A 
superior  scholar  and  a  born  teacher,  of  cultured  and  pleasing 
manners,  he  sustained  his  chair  twenty-six  years  with  distin- 
guished ability,  and  won  the  confidence  and  affection  of  his 
pupils  as  few  have  been  able  to  do.  In  recognition  of  his 
superior  scholarship,  liis  alma  mater  honored  him  with  the 
degree  of  LL.D.  in  1850.  President  Smith  held  the  position 
five  years,  during  which  time  the  institution  continued  to 
maintain  its  high  grade  of  scholarship,  and  its  financial  inter- 
ests were  materially  advanced  by  his  personal  efforts.  Pledges 
were  secured  amounting  to  $100,000,  and  something  over 
$80,000  were  collected  and  added  to  the  endowment  of  pro- 
fessorships. An  iron  fence  in  front  of  the  campus  took  the 
place  of  tlie  unsightly  wooden  one,  and  other  valuable  im- 
provements were  made. 

At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  joint  board,  August,  1857, 
Dr.  Smith  tendered    his  resignation,  and  subsequently  was 


Wesley  AN  Uxiversity.  181 

elected  to  the  professorsliip  of  natural  philosophy  in  the 
United  States  Naval  Academy  at  Annapolis,  Md.  Appreci- 
ating the  superior  qualifications  of  Professor  Smith,  the  gov- 
ernment at  Washington,  in  1860,  appointed  him  one  of  the 
astronomical  corps  sent  to  Labrador  to  make  observations 
upon  the  solar  eclipse.  He  died  at  Annapolis,  March  22, 
1866.  Thus  passed  away,  nmch  lamented,  a  superior  scholar, 
a  rare  teacher,  and  a  devout  Christian  man. 

When  President  Smith  resigned,  the  university  had  gradu- 
ated twenty-five  classes,  numbering,  in  all,  live  hundred  and 
seventy-eight.  Among  this  large  body  of  alumni  many  had 
acquired  prominence  before  the  public  for  scholarship,  pulpit 
ability,  success  in  the  professions  of  medicine  and  law,  and  as 
practical  educators;  and  a  very  general  feeling  seemed  to 
prevail  that  the  university  need  not  go  outside  its  own  alumni 
to  find  a  man  to  till  the  presidential  chair.  In  accord  with 
this  sentiment  the  choice  fell  upon  Rev.  Joseph  Cum- 
mings,  D.D.,  then  president  of  Genesee  College,  at  Lima, 
N.  Y.  Dr.  Cumming3  was  born,  March  3,  1817,  in  Fal- 
mouth, a  few  miles  out  of  Portland,  Maine  ;  prepared  for  col- 
lege at  the  Maine  Wesleyan  Seminary,  at  Readfield  ;  was  grad- 
uated at  Wesleyan  University  in  the  class  of  1840 ;  filled  the 
chair  of  mathematics  and  natural  science  in  Amenia  Semi- 
nary for  three  years ;  was  elected  principal  of  the  same  in 
1843,  and  conducted  tliat  then  prosperous  school  for  three 
years  more  with  marked  success.  In  1846  he  was  received 
into  the  New  England  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episco- 
])a]  Church,  and  spent  the  next  eight  years  in  pastoral  labor. 
In  1853  he  was  invited  to  take  the  chair  of  theology  in  the 
Methodist  General  Biblical  Institute  at  Concord,  N.  II.  The 
next  year,  1854,  he  received  the  doctor^s  degree  from  his 
alma  mater^  and  was  elected  to  the  presidency  of  Genesee 


182  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

College,  at  Lima,  IST.  Y.  He  conducted  the  growing  inter- 
ests of  that  college  with  the  recognized  ability  that  had 
crowned  with  success  his  labors  elsewhere,  till  elected,  in 
1857,  to  thie  chair  once  occupied  by  those  rare  men,  Wilbur 
Fisk  and  Stephen  Olin.  The  new  president  entered  upon 
his  duties  with  an  open  field  and  inviting  prospects.  The 
meuibers  of  the  earlier  faculty  had  all  passed  away  or  retired 
except  the  veteran  professor  who  had  filled  with  distin- 
guished ability  the  chair  of  natural  science  since  1835,  John 
Johnston,  LL.D.,  and  Professor  H.  B.  Lane,  A.M.,  who  had 
also  rendered  valuable  service  in  his  chair,  and  especially  in 
the  financial  interests  of  the  university.  Of  commanding 
port,  affable  in  manners,  a  clear  thinker,  with  executive  and 
financial  abilities  of  a  high  order,  and  varied  experience  in 
positions  previously  occupied.  Dr.  Cummings,  as  w^as  antici- 
pated by  those  who  knew  him  most  intimatelj^,  rendered  his 
administration  memorable  for  efficiency  and  success,  through 
the  comparatively  long  period  of  eighteen  years.  Professor 
Winchester,  in  the  "Alumni  Kecord,"  1881-'83,  expresses 
his  estimate  as  follows  : 

*'  The  personal  force  and  energy  of  President  Cummings, 
his  tireless  industry,  his  hearty  devotion  to  the  welfare  of 
the  college,  together  with  his  skill  and  popularity  as  an 
instructor,  combined  to  make  his  administration,  in  many 
respects,  a  successful  one.  It  was  particularly  marked  by  the 
growth  of  the  material  interests  of  the  institution,  in  which 
President  Cummings  always  took  especial  concern.  To  his 
labors  the  college  is  principally  indebted  for  the  line  of  noble 
buildinors  that  now  crown  the  hill." 

In  1868  a  tasteful  library  building,  costing  $40,000,  and 
capable  of  containing  one  hundred  thousand  volumes,  was 
erected  by  the  late  Isaac  Rich,  Esq.,  of  Boston,  and  about  the 


Wesleyan  University.  183 

same  time  he  increased  his  subscription  to  the  endowment 
fund  to  $100,000.  Observatory  Hall  underwent  important 
changes,  and  received  one  of  Alvan  Clark's  iinest  refracting 
telescopes.  A  Library  Fund,  of  $27,600,  was  contributed  by 
the  alumni.  In  1871  the  Memorial  Chapel  was  erected, 
costing  some  $60,000,  and  the  same  year  was  completed 
the  Orange  Judd  Hall  of  Natural  Science,  the  munificent 
gift  of  Orange  Judd,  Esq.,  an  alumnus  of  1847,  at  a  cost  of 
$100,000.  In  1872  the  curriculum  of  studies  was  enlarged 
and  modified  by  the  extension  of  the  elective  system,  and  in 
the  fall  of  the  same  year  the  university  was  opened  for 
the  admission  of  ladies.  His  success  as  the  head  of  the 
university  had  secured  for  Dr.  Cummings  recognition  at 
Harvard  by  the  honorary  D.D.  in  1861,  and  that  of  LL.D. 
by  the  North-western  University  in  1866.  He  resigned  the 
presidency  in  1875,  but  continued  in  charge  of  the  depart- 
ment of  mental  and  moral  philosophy  and  political  economy 
nearly  three  years ;  then  returning  to  the  pastorate,  he  was 
stationed  successively  at  Maiden,  Mass.,  and  at  Harvard  Street, 
Cambridge,  Mass. 

In  1881  Dr.  Cummings  was  Elected  president  of  the  North- 
western University  at  Evanston,  111.,  and  now,  with  the 
vigor  and  energy  that  characterized  his  earlier  years,  he  is 
strengthening  the  foundations  of  that  large  and  growing  uni- 
versity. 

At  the  meeting  of  the  joint  board,  in  June,  1875,  another 
alumnus^  Rev.  Cyrus  David  Foss,  D.D.,  w^as  elected  to  the 
presidential  chair  of  Wesleyan  University. 

Dr.  Foss  was  born  in  Kingston,  Ulster  County,  N.  Y., 
1831:;  was  graduated  in  the  class  of  1854;  was  teacher  of 
mathematics  in  Amenia  Seminary  two  years ;  was  then  elected 
prinoipiil  of  the  same,  which  ])osition  he  resigned  at  the  end 


181  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

of  the  year,  preferring  the  active  pastorate.  He  was 
received  into  the  New  York  Conference  of  the  Metliodist 
Episcopal  Church  in  1857,  and  spent  the  next  eighteen 
years  in  pastoral  charges.  When  Dr.  Foss  assumed  the 
duties  of  tlie  presidency  the  university  had  been  in  operation 
forty-four  years,  and  had  graduated  forty-two  classes.  It  had 
made  substantial  progress  in  all  its  departments ;  its  officers 
and  instructors  had  increased  from  five  to  sixteen,  its  college 
edifices  from  two  to  seven,  its  students  from  forty-eight  to 
one  hundred  and  seventy-six,  its  library  from  three  thousand 
to  twenty -six  thousand  volumes,  its  property,  of  all  kinds,  to 
about  $1,000,000.  Large  expenditures  for  instruments  and 
cabinets  had  also  been  made,  adding  greatly  to  the  means  for 
instruction.  But,  notwithstanding  tliis  favorable  showing, 
President  Foss  found  the  university  greatly  in  need  of  larger 
resources.  Says  Professor  Winchester,  "Alumni  Record," 
1881-83  :  "  The  growth  of  the  endowment  during  the  previ- 
ous ten  years  had  by  no  means  kept  pace  with  the  growth  of 
the  unproductive  wealth  of  the  college  in  buildings,  collec- 
tions, and  other  material  facilities.  The  increase  in  the  num- 
ber of  buildings,  and  the  needful  enlargement  of  the  coift-se 
of  study,  rendered  the  annual  expenditures,  of  necessity, 
greater  than  ever,  while,  on  the  other  hand,  in  the  general 
stagnation  of  business  and  financial  depression  that  followed 
the  panic  of  1873,  the  productive  property  of  the  college  had 
depreciated  greatly  in  value.  The  annual  expenditure  was 
about  $40,000,  the  annual  income,  from  all  sources,  only 
$20,000."  In  addition  to  this  a  debt  had  been  allowed  to 
accumulate,  and  was  rapidly  increasing  from  this  annual 
deficit.  Dr.  Foss  presented  the  matter  to  the  Conferences, 
and  stated,  in  1876,  that  "  only  large  and  generous  help, 
promptly  given,  could  save  it  from  disaster." 


Wesley  AN  Untv^ersity.  185 

In  this  emergency  the  friends  of  the  college  responded 
nobly.  The  trustees  put  their  hands  into  their  own  pockets, 
and'  met  largely  the  annual  deficit ;  the  alumni  subscribed 
and  paid  in  nearly  $40,000,  and  others  also  came  to  the  res- 
cue with  liberal  subscriptions.  By  this  promptness  the  debt 
was  soon  paid  and  danger  averted.  During  the  five  years  of 
President  Foss's  administration,  and  principally  through  his 
untiring  efforts,  about  $250,000  were  added,  by  subscription, 
to  the  Endowment  Fund,  and  a  large  portion  of  it  paid  in. 
Professor  Winchester,  in  "  Alumni  Record,"  1881-83,  adds : 
"  But  it  was  not  financial  success  alone  that  marked  the  ad- 
ministration of  President  Foss.  A  character  so  noble,  a 
kindness  and  courtesy  so  unvarying,  an  enthusiasm  for  good- 
ness so  inspiring,  a  piety  so  high  and  pure — these  could  not 
fail  of  their  effect  upon  all  who  knew  him.  His  influence 
was  itself  an  education  of  the  best  sort."  His  eminent  pul- 
pit abilities,  as  well  as  his  success  in  the  pastoral  work, 
received  becomint'  recoornition  bv  his  alma  mater,  which 
conferred  D.D.  in  1870,  and  he  was  honored  with  LL.D.  by 
Cornell  University,  of  Iowa,  in  1879.  The  General  Confer- 
ence of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  in  May,  1880, 
elected  Dr.  Foss  one  of  its  Bishops.  This  action  of  the 
Conference  deprived  the  university  of  its  able  and  popular 
president.  At  the  annual  meeting  of  the  trustees,  in  June 
following,  the  vacancy  thus  created  was  filled  by  the  election 
of  another  alumnus  to  the  presidency,  Rev.  John  Wesley 
Beach,  D.D. 

Dr.  Beach,  born  in  Trumbull,  Conn.,  1825,  was  graduated 
in  1845,  and,  like  his  last  two  predecessors,  taught  in  Amenia 
Seminary,  was  principal  of  the  same  for  three  years,  and  then 
devoted  himself  to  the  ministry.  He  joined  the  New  York 
Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  1854,  and 


186  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

spent  twenty-six  years  in  the  pastorate  and  presiding  elder- 
ship, filling  some  of  the  principal  stations  in  the  New  York 
and  ISTew  York  East  Conferences,  also  the  presiding  elder- 
ship on  the  New  York  District.  In  1872  his  alma  mater 
honored  him  with  the  degree  of  D.D.  The  well-known 
scholarship  of  Dr.  Beach,  as  well  as  his  pulpit  ability  and 
success  in  the  pastorate,  turned  attention  to  him  as  tlie  suc- 
cessor of  Bishop  Foss  fro  the  presidential  chair.  During  the 
early  years  of  his  administration  large  subscriptions  were 
made  to  the  Permanent  Fund,  and  also  to  tlie  Scholarship 
Fund  of  the  college,  which  encouraged  its  friends  to  hope 
that  the  dawn  of  a  still  greater  usefulness  had  commenced ; 
but  financial  disaster  has  overtaken  some  of  its  most  liberal 
contributors,  and  it  becomes  necessary  to  renew  the  appeal  to 
the  public  for  immediate  aid.  President  Beach,  with  heart 
and  zeal,  is  laboring  to  repair  the  financial  losses,  so  that  the 
university  may  not  be  obliged  to  call  a  halt  in  its  onward 
progress. 

GENERAL   SUMMARY,  1885. 

Whole  number  of  graduates 1,415 

Number  of  students  now  in  college 193 

Officers  and  instructors 20 

Real-estate $400,000  00 

Personal  property  (library,  museum,  appurtenances,  etc.) $109,300  00 

Productive  resources  (excluding  Library  Fund) $673,286  58 

Annual  liabilities  (annuities,  prizes,  etc.) $754  22 

Volumes  in  the  library 34,000 

Library  Fund $1 8,792  00 

Total  receipts,  including  subscriptions  for  current  expenses $46,657  08 

Expenditures,  1884-'85 $44,665  94 


Dickinson  College.  187 


CHAPTER  YIL 

DICKINSON      COLLEGE. 

BY  PROFESSOR  J.  H.  MORGAN,   A.M. 

Dickinson  College  lias  now  more  than  a  century  of  his- 
tory; her  charter  bearing  the  date  of  1783,  the  year  in 
which  the  independence  of  the  colonies  was  conceded  by 
England.  There  are  a  few  older  institutions  in  the  country, 
but  none,  probably,  founded  under  less  favorable  circum- 
stances. The  infancy  of  Dickinson  fell  on  a  time,  compared 
with  which  there  has  been  no  other  in  our  history  so  un- 
friendly to  the  nurture  of  such  an  infancy.  The  war  for 
independence  had  left  the  colonies  impoverished  and  de- 
])ressed,  currency  almost  valueless,  credit  fallen  to  decay, 
commerce  spreading  scarce  a  sail,  schools  for  higher  educa- 
tion weak  and  exhausted,  and,  worst  of  all,  the  problem  of 
government  yet  to  be  solved.  Under  such  circumstances  a 
calculating  prudence  would  have  counseled  delay  in  founding 
a  college  until  affairs  had  once  more  assumed  their  normal 
condition,  till  credit  had  been  restored,  and  education  had 
begun  to  be  felt  as  a  want  by  the  people.  The  clear  idea  of 
the  needs  of  the  time,  and  the  lofty  motives  which  actuated 
the  moving  spirits  in  the  enterprise,  apparently  so  un- 
promising, are  so  clearly  set  forth  in  the  early  records  of  the 
institution,  that  in  their  light  it  is  less  a  matter  of  surprise 
that  the  effort  was  made.  Says  the  preamble  and  enacting 
clause  of  the  charter : 

Section  I.  Whereas^  The  happiness  and  prosperity  of  every  commu- 
nity  (under  the  direction   and  government  of    Divine    Providence) 


188  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

depends  much  on  the  right  education  of  the  youth,  who  must  succeed 
the  aged  in  the  important  offices  of  society,  and  the  most  exalted 
nations  have  acquired  their  pre-eminence  by  the  virtuous  principles  and 
liberal  knowledge  instilled  into  the  minds  of  the  rising  generation: 

Section  II.  And  whereas,  After  a  long  and  bloody  contest  with  a  great 
and  powerful  kingdom,  it  has  pleased  Almighty  God  to  restore  to  the 
United  States  of  America  the  blessings  of  a  general  peace,  whereby  the 
good  people  of  this  State,  relieved  from  the  burdens  of  war,  are  placed 
in  a  condition  to  attend  to  useful  arts,  sciences,  and  literature,  and  it  is 
the  evident  duty  and  interest  of  all  ranks  of  people  to  promote  and 
encourage,  as  much  as  in  thftn  lies,  every  attempt  to  disseminate  and 
promote  the  growth  of  useful  knowledge: 

Section  III.  And  whereas.  By  the  petition  of  a  large  number  of  per- 
sons ...  it  appears  that  the  institution  of  a  college  at  the  borough  of 
Carlisle  ...  for  the  instruction  of  youth  in  the  learned  languages,  and 
other  branches  of  literature,  is  likely  to  promote  the  real  welfare  of  this 
State: 

Section  V.  Be  it  therefore  enacted,  and  it  is  hereby  enacted  by  the 
Representatives  of  the  freemen  of  the  Commonwealth  of  Pennsylvania, 
in  General  Assembly  met,  and  by  the  authority  of  the  same,  that  there 
be  erected,  and  hereby  is  erected  and  established  in  the  borough  of 
Carlisle,  in  the  County  of  Cumberland,  in  this  State,  a  college  .  .  .  the 
style,  name,  and  title  of  which  said  college,  and  the  constitution 
thereof,  shall  be,  and  are  hereby  declared  to  be,  as  is  hereafter  men- 
tioned and  defined ;  that  is  to  say : 

1.  In  memory  of  the  great  and  important  services  rendered  to  his 
country  by  his  excellency,  John  Dickinson,  Esq.,  president  of  the 
Supreme  Executive  Council,  and  in  commemoration  of  his  very  liberal 
donation  to  the  institution,  the  said  college  shall  be  forever  hereafter 
called  and  known  by  the  name  of  Dickinson  College. 

The  official  seal  of  the  college — a  Bible,  telescope,  and  cap 
of  liberty,  witli  Pietate  et  doctrina  tiita  lihertas  as  the 
motto,  gives  additional  evidence  that  the  preservation  of 
their  newly  acquired  liberties  was  the  task  they  proposed  to 
accomplish  by  liberal  education.     Says  Dr.  Rush,  one  of  the 


Dickinson  College.  189 

trustees,  in  an  essay  addressed  to  the  Legislature,  on  tlie 
"Modes  of  Education  Proper  for  our  Republic:"  "Let  our 
pupil  be  taught  that  he  does  not  belong  to  himself,  but  that 
he  is  public  property." 

Of  the  leading  spirits  busied  about  the  parturition  of  the 
college,  it  needs  but  that  their  names  be  mentioned.  Their 
fame  is  too  well  assured  to  make  it  necessary  or  even  desira- 
ble that  attempt  should  be  made  to  retell  the  story  of  their 
lives,  already  the  possession  of  the  nation.  Dr.  Benjamin 
Rush,  one  of  the  signers  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence, 
the  chief  promoter  of  the  enterprise,  by  his  means  and  his 
counsel  gave  it,  through  thirty  years,  enthusiastic  service,  and 
in  a  letter  to  a  friend,  twenty-live  years  after  the  founding  of 
the  college,  says :  "  I  feel  now  all  the  ardor  I  felt  at  its  [the 
college's]  establishment."  His  careful  attention  to  the  details 
of  the  work  of  the  college  was  invaluable  to  it,  and  his  hope- 
fulness gave  inspiration  in  its  darkest  hours.  His  excel- 
lency, John  Dickinson,  "the  farmer,"  author  of  the  "  Let- 
ters of  Fabius,"  during  the  early  years  of  its  life,  contributed 
more  largely  of  his  means  to  the  endowment  of  the  college 
than  any  other  individual.  His  gifts  were  munificent  for 
his  time,  and  if  they  seem  small  when  compared  with  those 
of  a  later  time,  the  difference  represents  not  a  difference  in 
devotion  to  the  cause,  but  in  means,  and  in  the  spirit  of  the  age. 

Through  the  efforts  of  Dr.  Rush,  Charles  Nisbet,  D.D.,  was 
secured  as  first  president  of  the  college.  He  had  been  a 
friend  of  the  colonies  during  the  Revolution,  and  fifteen  years 
before  had  been  recommended  to  the  trustees  of  Princeton 
College  by  Dr.  Witherspoon,  "  as  the  person  of  all  his 
acquaintance  fittest "  for  the  first  president  of  Princeton  Col- 
lege, though  Dr.  Witherspoon  himself  was  finally  induced 
to  accept  the  position. 


190  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Dr.  Nisbet  reached  this  country  in  the  summer  of  1785, 
and  was  everj-where  treated  with  the  greatest  consideration. 
But  there  was  an  herculean  task  in  waiting  for  him.  Al- 
though school  work  had  been  begun  at  Carlisle,  the  college 
had  practically  yet  to  be  made.  The  only  building  at  the 
disposal  of  the  trustees  was  a  house  containing  four  rooms, 
situated  on  one  of  the  alleys  of  the  town ;  and  for  nearly 
twenty  years  this  was  the  only  available  building.  Profess- 
ors were  to  be  secured,  and,  what  was  more  difficult,  their 
salaries  provided  for.  In  fact,  almost  every  provision  neces- 
sary for  even  a  decent  equipment  had  to  be  made  after  his 
arrival. 

As  might  have  been  expected  of  a  scholarly  man,  accus- 
tomed to  the  habits  of  scholars,  to  whom  the  hardy  self-reli- 
ance of  life  in  a  new  country  was  entirely  unknown— dream- 
ing the  enthusiast's  dream  as  to  the  easy  sway  of  reason  over 
the  minds  of  men  *'  free  from  the  shackles  of  authority ; " 
expecting  the  ideal,  but  finding  the  real — as  was  to  be  ex- 
pected, he  was  not  altogether  fitted  to  the  work  of  the  Amer- 
ican pioneer.  Yet,  be  it  said  to  his  lasting  credit,  after  the 
first  severe  attack  of  longing  for  his  dear  old  home,  with 
unswerving  fidelity  of  purpose  he  addressed  himself  to  the 
trying  duties  of  his  position,  doing  an  amount  of  work  which 
would  seem  simply  incredible.  In  view  of  the  small  number 
of  teachers,  he  felt  called  upon,  in  bringing  the  college  curric- 
ulum nearer  his  ideal,  to  enlarge  the  work  of  his  own  depart- 
ment, adding  four  co-ordinate  courses  of  lectures,  and  at  the 
request  of  a  class,  yet  a  fifth.  It  is  a  picture  well  worthy  of 
our  admiration,  this  man  of  pre-eminent  scholarship,  in  a 
scholarly  age,  at  home  in  almost  all  fields  of  knowledge, 
bred  in  the  quiet  of  European  university  life,  faultlessly 
adjusted  to  his  position  as  Scottish  clergyman,  leaving  the 


Dickinson  College.  101 

liomc  of  liis  youth  and  early  manhood — exchanging  quiet  for 
turmoil,  comfort  for  discomfort,  ease  for  struggle — throwing 
the  whole  energy  of  a  strong  massive  nature  into  the  pioneer 
educational  work  of  a  new  and  undeveloped  country,  and 
(lying  finally  without  the  assurance  that  he  had  builded  for 
the  generations  to  come — such  was  Nisbet's  life.  He  died 
in  1804  while  the  college's  struggle  for  existence  was  yet 
unsettled,  while  it  was  yet  to  be  determined  whether  it 
would  live  or  die.  He  died,  but  his  work  remains.  The 
place  of  the  college  for  which  he  labored,  and  hoped,  and 
feared  is  now  assured,  and  so  long  as  Dickinson  College  shall 
live  will  the  name  of  Charles  Nisbet  be  remembered. 

Though  not  distinctly  denominational,  the  college  was 
Presbyterian  in  its  administration,  and  Dr.  Davidson,  a  Pres- 
byterian divine,  was  chosen  to  succeed  Dr.  Nisbet;  but  after 
five  years  he  resigned,  to  devote  himself  to  the  work  of  the 
pastorate. 

Jeremiah  Atwater,  D.D.,  president  of  Middlebury  College, 
Vermont,  succeeded  him  in  1809,  and  his  administration 
gave  promise  of  large  success.  The  number  of  students 
rapidly  increased,  the  faculty  was  strengthened,  and  the 
Sophomore  was  added  to  the  three  classes,  which  till  that 
time  had  comprised  the  course.  But  trouble  was  brewing. 
The  war  with  England  almost  robbed  the  college  of  stu- 
dents, so  that  degrees  were  conferred  on  one  class  during 
their  absence  in  the  army.  A  duel  in  1815  resulted  in  the 
death  of  a  member  of  the  Junior  class ;  and  a  lawless  spirit 
prevailing  generally  seems  to  have  brought  the  college  into 
disrepute.  The  latter,  however,  is  in  no  sense  surprising, 
when  the  great  difficulties  encountered  in  internal  adminis- 
tration are  known.  By  a  fatal  defect  in  the  charter  of  the 
college  the  trustees  were  made  a  final  court  of  appeal  in  all 


192  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

cases  of  discipline,  and  seem  to  have  had  greater  love  for 
authority  than  wisdom  in  its  use.  Under  such  circumstances, 
with  an  appeal  from  the  faculty  to  the  trustees  always  possi- 
ble, and  with  the  trustees  too  often  rendering  decisions 
adverse  to  those  of  the  faculty,  it  is  not  strange  that  things 
grew  continually  worse  until  finally,  in  1815,  a  crisis  was  pre- 
cipitated by  an  order  requiring  the  president  and  professors 
to  make  weekly  report  to  the  trustees  of  every  delinquency, 
the  judgment  of  the  faculty,  and  the  extent  to  which  it  had 
been  executed.  Within  three  months  the  president  and  most 
of  the  faculty  had  resigned.  Successors  were  elected,  but 
in  1816  the  college  was  closed ;  and,  though  opened  again,  it 
was  generally  felt  that  there  were  obstacles  in  the  incubus  of 
poverty,  and  the  absence  of  harmony  and  vigor  in  the  board 
of  trustees,  which  no  ability  of  instruction  could  countervail ; 
that  there  was  a  general  tendency  to  decline,  and  that  the 
college  was  doomed. 

During  this  declension  there  were,  it  is  true,  periods  of 
temporary  prosperity,  seldom,  however,  outlasting  the  tran- 
sient impulse  to  which  they  were  due.  The  most  notable 
instance  of  this  was  during  the  brief  presidency  of  Dr.  John 
M.  Mason,  from  1821  to  1824.  Esteemed  the  most  eloquent 
divine  of  his  day.  Dr.  Mason  attracted  to  the  college  a  large 
number  of  young  men,  and  some  of  the  best  classes  ever 
graduated  from  the  college — notably  that  of  1823 — belong  to 
this  period.  Prosperity,  however,  passed  away  w^ith  the 
man ;  and  the  guardians  of  the  college,  wearying  of  the  effort 
to  prolong  its  languishing  life,  were  willing  to  surrender 
their  charge  to  others. 

At  this  period  of  discouragement  came  overtures  from  the 
Baltimore  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church, 
looking  to  the  securing  of   the  college  to  the  Conference. 


Dickinson  College.  193 

For  a  long  period  the  Methodists  had  taken  but  little  ap- 
parent interest  in  the  work  of  higher  education.  Some 
early  enterprises  of  the  kind  had  resulted  so  disastrously  as 
seemingly  to  disincline  them  to  similar  undertakings.  How- 
ever this  may  have  been,  the  Church  was  beginning  to  expe- 
rience a  powerful  reaction,  and  schools  were  being  estab- 
lished here  and  there  under  her  direct  control.  As  a  result 
of  this  revival  the  Baltimore  and  Philadelphia  Conferences, 
the  latter  having  consented  to  share  in  the  undertaking, 
began  to  form  plans  for  the  establishment  of  a  college 
within  their  borders ;  and  attention  having  been  turned  to 
Dickinson,  as  possible  of  attainment,  negotiations,  looking  to 
tliis  end,  were  entered  upon,  and  finally  brought  to  a  success- 
ful consummation. 

In  1833,  at  the  close  of  the  first  half-century  of  the  col- 
lege's life,  the  trustees  met  to  consider  what  was  best  to  be 
dune.  After  deliberations  protracted  through  a  week,  it  was 
decided  to  transfer  the  college  to  the  Conferences  above 
named.  By  this  transfer  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church 
became  possessed  of  a  college  rich  in  memories  of  half  a 
century,  of  a  well-stocked  library,  a  fine  campus  with  a  com- 
modious building  on  it,  erected  in  1805,  and  now  known 
as  West  College,  and  a  small  amount  of  money,  sufiicient  to 
pay  all  debts  and  make  some  needed  repairs,  and  to  put  the 
campus  into  such  shape  that  it  might  grow  into  beauty. 

The  new  administrator  were  in  a  position  to  profit  by  the 
mistakes  of  their  predecessors.  Unity  and  vigor  of  govern- 
ment was  secured  by  the  transfer  of  the  college  to  a  single 
religious  body.  Before  this  it  had  belonged  distinctively  to 
no  Church,  and  the  fact  that  Presbyterian  influence  predomi- 
nated, only  rendered  other  denominations  jealous.  Such 
lireduniinance  had  Presbyterians  obtained  in  the  counsels  of 


19i  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

the  college  that  the  belief  yet  prevails  that  the  Presbyterian 
Church  surrendered  the  college  to  the  Methodists,  but  such 
was  not  the  case.  The  accident  of  superior  numbers  and 
resources  in  the  community  had  rendered  them  most  influen- 
tial in  its  administration,  but  had  given  theu\  no  right  not 
erpially  shared  by  Episcopalians  and  Lutherans,  both  of  whom 
were  represented  in  the  faculty  and  in  the  board  of  trustees. 
The  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  was  not  only  to  govern, 
but  to  govern,  all  consenting  to  her  right.  An  amended 
charter  was  secured.  The  right  of  the  trustees  to  act  in  mat- 
ters of  internal  government  was  greatly  lessened.  As  re- 
vised, the  charter  gave  the  trustees  a  merely  nominal  power 
to  act  as  a  court  of  appeal.  In  case  of  formal  expulsion 
only  was  there  a  right  of  appeal  from  the  faculty  to  the 
trustees ;  and  this  did  not  apply  to  cases  of  dismissal.  Tims 
was  settled  the  old  trouble,  and  it  has  been  heai-d  of  no 
more. 

Counsel  was  taken  also  from  the  previous  struggle  with 
poverty,  and  it  was  determined  not  to  open  the  institution 
until  an  endowment  fund  of  at  least  $45,000  should  be  se- 
cured. As  an  earnest,  however,  of  their  purpose  to  open 
the  college  at  an  early  day,  the  new  board  elected  John  A. 
Durbin,  D.D.,  to  the  presidency.  The  college  was  opened 
in  September,  1834,  and  Dr.  Durbin  then  entered  upon  his 
duties,  and  six  professorships  w^ere  established.  George  E. 
Crooks,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  has  well  described  in  his  centennial 
oration  before  the  college,  this  period  and  some  of  the  mem- 
bers of  this  first  faculty,  destined  to  fill  so  large  a  place  in 
the  history  of  the  college  and  the  Church  : 

On  a  beautiful  July  morniug  in  1834  the  writer  left  Philadelphia, 
with  his  parents,  for  Carlisle.  A  journey  of  a  day  brought  the  travel- 
eis  to  Columbia,  and  another,  of  mgi-e  than  half  the  night  by  stage,  to 


Dickinson  College.  195 

Harrisburg.  Setting  out  early  the  next  morning  the  tedium  of  the  slow 
progress  was  relieved  by  the  charm  of  the  conversation  of  Chief-Justice 
Gibson,  who,  though  unknown  to  us,  was  as  affable  as  an  old  and  cher- 
ished acquaintance.  What  a  scene  of  calm  repose  lay  before  the  won- 
dering eyes  of  the  city  boy !  The  old  college,  graceful  in  its  unadorned 
simplicity,  the  budding  green  of  the  newly  planted  trees  of  the  campus, 
the  haze  of  the  blue  that  softened  the  aspect  of  the  mountains  on  either 
side,  made  a  picture  which  stamped  itself  forever  on  the  memory.  Nor 
care,  nor  grief,  nor  toil,  nor  absence  can  corrode  one  of  its  outlines,  or 
dim  a  single  tint.  Surely  this  was  "the  Happy  Valley,"  shut  in  and 
consecrated  to  quiet  meditation  and  blissful  thought !  A  school  had 
been  opened,  and  under  Alexander  F.  Dobb,  a  thorough  drill-master 
of  the  English  style,  boys  and  youth  were  making  good  progress  in 
the  classics.  A  sweet  homelike  feeling  pervaded  the  school,  for  this 
wa.s  the  blossom  time  of  tender  hope.  The  old  tree  which  had  borne 
the  blasts  of  half  a  century  was  putting  forth  the  promise  of  a  new 
fruitage. 

On  the  10th  of  September,  the  procession  of  president,  trustees, 
and  scholars  was  formed,  and  we  marched  to  the  plain  old  church  in 
Methodist  Alley,  where  Dr.  Durbin  delivered  his  inaugural  address. 
How  many  such  processions  had  Carlisle  seen,  how  many  openings  and 
rcopenings  whose  bright  promise  had  faded  away  into  the  darkness  of 
the  night,  and  whose  broken  hopes  had  saddened  devoted  hearts  I 
Would  this  one,  bald  in  its  simplicity,  foretoken  success  or  failure?  It 
meant  success ;  not  because  the  new  organizers  were  more  tenacious  of 
purpose  than  the  old,  but  because  Dickinson  College  had  now  become 
one  in  and  with  itself.  Hereafter  it  was  to  have  but  one  spirit ;  but  one 
purpose,  and  that  avowed;  one  source  of  sustenance,  the  Church,  of 
which  it  was  to  be  the  organ.  Poverty  was  before  it,  trials  were  before 
it,  but  in  all  the  poverty  and  all  the  trials  it  was  understood  that  Dick- 
inson College  was  to  live  or  to  die,  as  it  was  sustained  or  not  sus- 
tained by  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 

Come  to  me,  ye  memories  of  long  past  years,  and  bring  before  me 
again  those  beloved,  those  idolized  men,  the  members  of  our  first 
faculty.  I  see  Emory,  the  picture  of  manly  vigor,  walking  up  the 
chapel  aisle,  and  taking  the  oath  of  office  administered  by  Judge  Reed. 
Durbin,  whose  large,  lustrous  eyes  fascinate  the  beholder,  reads  once 


196  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

more,  with  slow  and  measured  accent,  the  morning  lesson  from  the 
chapel  pulpit,  and  offers  the  simple  prayer  of  childlike  faith  and  trust. 
Caldwell,  the  Christian  Aristides,  tender  and  just,  sits  again  in  his 
chair,  and  with  slow  and  hesitating  speech  unfolds  the  intricacies  of 
mathematics,  or  clears  up  a  dark  point  in  psychology.  M'Clintock,  as 
radiant  as  Apollo,  and  as  swift,  too,  as  a  beam  of  light,  amazes  us  by 
the  energy  with  which  he  quickens  our  minds.  Allen,  massive  in  form 
and  solid  as  his  own  New  England  granite,  moves  among  us  to  show 
us  how  transcendent  power  can  be  blended  and  interfused  with  a  sunny 
temper.  But  what  shall  I  say  of  him,  the  man  of  genius  of  that  broth- 
erhood, whose  lips  had  been  touched  with  celestial  fire,  orator,  adminis- 
trator, the  matchless  John  P.  Durbin?  In  the  class-room  his  conversa- 
tion was  more  brilliant  than  the  text  which  he  explained.  His  fertile 
and  suggestive  mind  wandered  from  point  to  point,  and  we  sat  exhila- 
rated as  new  vistas  of  truth,  one  after  the  other,  opened  before  us.  Or 
it  is  Sabbath  morning,  and  he  occupies  his  throne,  the  pulpit.  The 
text  is,  "  Wherefore  God  also  hath  highly  exalted  him,  and  given  him 
a  name  which  is  above  every  name ; "  the  theme,  the  humiliation  and 
exaltation  of  Christ.  The  first  propositions  are  so  simple  that  they  seem 
truisms,  the  first  manner  is  so  didactic  that  but  for  the  composure  of 
the  speaker  you  would  resent  the  attempt  to  fix  your  attention  by  such 
methods.  Statements  are  made  so  obviously  convincing  that  you  won- 
der you  had  never  thought  of  them  before.  He  holds  you,  and  you 
cannot  choose  but  listen.  All  the  time  the  enchanter  is  weaving  his 
spell  about  you,  and  preparing  for  the  triumphant  assertion  of  his 
power.  Suddenly — as  suddenly  as  the  lightning's  flash — his  vehemence 
and  passion  burst  upon  you.  The  torrents  of  feeling  which  he  had 
until  now  sternly  repressed  flow  forth  with  irresistible  force.  He  has 
made  no  mistake;  he  has  calculated  to  a  nicety  his  possession  of  your 
sympathy,  and  you  are  borne  along  by  him  whithersoever  he  will.  His 
port  and  bearing  have  changed;  his  manner  is  that  of  one  fully  con- 
scious of  mastery  over  the  hearts  of  his  fellows,  and  his  voice,  vibrant 
with  emotion,  searches  all  the  recesses  of  the  soul.  You  are  absorbed, 
captured,  and  when  all  is  over  you  are  aware  that  for  a  time  you  had 
wholly  lost  consciousness  of  yourself. 

It  abates  nothing  from  these  facts  that  Dr.  Durbin's  powers  as  an 
orator  declined  after  he  had  committed  himself  wholly  to  admiuistra- 


Dickinson  College.  197 

tive  tasks.  In  his  later  years  he  lived  among  us  less  as  an  orator  and 
more  as  a  statesman ; 

*'  With  .  .  .  shoulders,  fit  to  bear 
The  weight  of  mightiest  mouurchies." 

lie  himself  never  grieved  over  the  change,  and  welcomed  the  men  who 
increased  in  public  favor  while  he  decreased;  for  he  was  careless  of 
fame,  solicitous  only  to  do  his  appointed  work  thoroughly  well.  It  was 
characteristic  of  him  that  he  destroyed  most  of  his  private  papers,  and 
forbade  the  writing  of  his  life. 

The  members  of  our  first  faculty  taught  as  much  by  their  virtues  as 
by  their  formal  lessons.  They  have  gone  to  their  graves.  Allen,  the 
last  of  the  company,  whom  we  had  hojxjd  to  have  with  us  to-day,  has 
joined  liis  colleagues  in  the  better  land. 

This  tribute  from  Dr.  Crooks  eeems  to  be  tlie  individual 
expression  of  a  general  sentiment  among  those  who  came  in 
contact  with  this  first  faculty.  To  nothing  connected  with 
their  college  life  are  the  students  of  that  time  more  quickly 
responsive  than  to  the  memory  of  that  company  of  young 
and  enthusiastic  men,  into  whose  keeping  the  Church  first 
committed  the  college. 

After  twelve  years  of  administration,  in  which  Dr.  Dur- 
bin's  wonderful  administrative  abilities  became  clearly  mani- 
fest, he  resigned  his  position,  for  the  sake  of  his  family,  and 
removed  to  Philadelphia.  Robert  Emory,  D.D.,  having 
served  the  college  as  professor  of  ancient  languages  from 
1S34  to  1840,  and  having  acted  as  president  of  the  college  in 
the  absence  of  Dr.  Durbin  in  the  East,  from  1842  to  1844, 
was  now  elected  president.  Dr.  Emory  was,  in  truth,  a  re- 
markable man.  AVhen  called  to  fill  the  chair  of  ancient  lan- 
guages he  was  fresh  from  Columbia  College,  and  but  little 
more  than  twenty  yeai*s  of  -age.  He  soon  showed  how 
worthy  he  was  of  a  place  with  the  men  who  gave  the  college 
a  reputation.     His  executive  power  was  great  and  versatile. 


198  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

In  everj  sphere  in  which  he  was  tried  tliere  was  the  demon- 
stration of  ability  tliat  ranked  him  with  the  first  in  each. 
At  the  early  age  of  thirty-four  he  passed  away  with  the  im- 
pression widely  made  that,  if  of  his  years  he  left  an  equal, 
he  left  no  superior  in  the  Church.  Except  a  brief  interval 
of  pastoral  service  his  working  life  was  given  to  Dickinson. 
He  died  in  1848. 

Jesse  T.  Peck,  D.D.,  succeeded  to  the  presidency,  but  re- 
signed at  the  close  of  four  years.  During  his  administration, 
Professor  Johnson  proposed  his  plan  for  increasing  the 
endowment  fund  of  the  college.  As  finall}^  matured  the 
plan  consisted  in  selling  a  very  large  number  of  scholarships 
at  little  more  than  a  nominal  price,  the  proceeds  to  be  de- 
voted to  the  permanent  endowment  fund.  It  was  expected 
that  the  plan  would  so  largely  increase  the  productive  funds 
of  the  college  as  to  render  it  in  a  large  measure  independent 
of  revenue  from  students.  Thousands  of  scholarships  w^ere 
sold — enough  to  seriously  lessen  the  income  of  the  college 
from  tuition  of  students,  but  not  enough  to  secure  all  that 
was  desired  in  enlarged  endowment.  Good,  liowever,  was 
accomplished.  Tuition  was  made  merely  nominal,  the  cost 
of  education  was  greatly  lessened  to  the  student,  and  the 
college  was  again  brought  prominently  before  the  Church. 

In  1852  Charles  Collins,  D.D.,  president  of  Emory  and 
Henry  College,  Virginia,  was  elected  to  succeed  Dr.  Peck. 
"With  his  election  the  college  entered  upon  a  period  of  great 
prosperity,  with  largely  increased  numbers  of  students.  After 
a  service  of  eight  years  he  resigned,  and  engaged  in  edu- 
cational work  in  Memphis,  Tenn.,  where  he  died.  Hermann 
M.  Johnson,  D.D.,  was  his  natural  successor,  and  entered 
upon  the  duties  of  his  position  in  1860,  on  the  eve  of  that 
great  struggle  between  the  North  and  South,  and  which  was 


Dickinson  College.  199 

to  try  the  college  most  severely,  looking,  as  it  did,  to  both  sec- 
tions for  its  patronage.  Notwithstanding  the  sudden  falling 
away  of  students,  and  the  fact  that  much  of  the  invested 
funds  of  the  college  became,  for  a  time,  unproductive,  so 
that  salaries  fell  largely  in  arrears,  the  regular  work  of  the 
college  was  continued.  Hopeful  in  the  midst  of  difficulty, 
the  faculty  remained  at  their  post  through  some  most  trying 
years.  To  the  latest  of  ^  her  history  it  will  be  for  a  praise  to 
them  that  through  all  discouragements  they  gave  the  help 
by  which,  though  bowed  and  staggering,  she  still  kept  on 
her  way.  As  a  result  of  the  centennial  effort  of  1866,  $100,- 
000  was  added  to  the  endowment;  but  Dr.  Johnson  died 
suddenly  in  1868,  not  reaping  where  he  had  sown. 

In  September  of  the  same  year  Robert  L.  Dashiell,  D.D., 
was  elected  president,  but  resigned  four  years  later  to  accept 
the  position  of  Corresponding  Secretary  of  the  Missionary 
Society  of  the  Church,  which  he  held  to  the  date  of  his 
death,  in  1879. 

In  1872  James  A.  McCauley,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  was  elected 
president  at  a  time  when  the  needs  of  the  college  were  very 
great,  and  the  means  at  her  command  very  small.  Increased 
demands  were  being  made  on  colleges  every-where,  and  Dick- 
inson seemed  for  the  time  unable  to  meet  these  demands. 
So  frequently  had  the  college  come  before  the  people  of  the 
patronizing  Conferences  asking  help,  that  it  seemed  hopeless 
to  make  yet  another  appeal.  Accordingly,  Dr.  McCauley 's 
iirst  years  were  given  to  a  careful  administration  of  the 
icsources  at  command,  special  care  being  given  to  the  eleva- 
tion of  the  standard  of  scholarship,  which  had  doubtless  suf- 
fered by  frequent  change  of  administration.  Such  was  his 
success  that  confidence  in  the  future  of  the  college  gradually 
increased,  and  in  1882  it  was  felt  that  the  time  had  come  to 


200  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

make  a  material  advance.  To  this  end  the  old  buildings, 
which  had  been  the  homes  of  so  many  generations  of  stu- 
dents, were  thoroughly  repaired,  and  a  policy  of  advance  in- 
augurated. No  mistake  had  been  made  in  choosing  the 
time.  Friends  were  raised  up  to  the  college  in  unexpected 
quarters,  and  her  endowment  fund  was  largely  increased, 
lion.  Thomas  Beaver,  of  Pennsylvania,  contributed  $30,000 
to  this  end ;  David  Carroll,  D.D.,  of  Baltimore,  contributed 
$10,000 ;  and  the  friends  of  the  college  came  to  her  centen- 
nial commencement,  in  1883,  bearing  rich  gifts  in  their  hands, 
$40,000  being  then  subscribed  to  her  funds,  and  a  new  build- 
ing for  scientific  purposes  ordered  to  be  built.  In  1884 
Hon.  Jacob  Tome,  one  of  the  trustees,  proposed  that  this 
building  should  be  erected  at  his  expense,  thus  liberating  to 
the  use  of  the  college  the  funds  set  apart  for  that  purpose. 
At  about  the  same  time  Mrs.  Helen  Bosler  was  induced 
to  erect  a  library  hall  for  the  college,  as  a  memorial  to  her 
husband,  James  W.  Bosler.  Another  friend  placed  funds 
in  the  liands  of  the  agent  of  the  college  for  the  erection  of 
a  gymnasium,  stipulating  only  that  liis  name  be  not  made 
known. 

These  buildings  were  admirably  adapted  to  meet  the  wants 
they  were  intended  to  supply.  The  scientific  building,  cost- 
ing about  $30,000,  besides  physical  and  chemical  laboratories 
and  recitation  rooms,  provides  for  a  commodious  museum. 
Bosler  Memorial  Library  Hall,  costing  about  $75,000,  v/ill 
furnish  accommodation  for  one  hundred  thousand  volumes, 
and  contains  also  a  capacious  assembly  hall,  suitable  to  the 
public  exercises  of  the  college. 

President  McCauley's  administration,  lasting  longer  than 
any  other  since  Dr.  Nisbet's,  has  seen  great  good  come  to 
the  college.     Great  strides  have  been  made  toward  putting 


DicKixNsoN  College.  201 

her  ill  a  position  of  secured  usefulness  and  independence. 
In  these  latter  days  seems  to  have  come  the  time  wished  for 
by  our  fathers.  The  college  is  established  beyond  perad- 
venture.  It  still  has  wants ;  but  these,  in  time,  will  have 
supply.  The  advance  already  made,  not  only  in  strengthen^ 
ing  the  resources  of  the  college,  but  in  inspiring  the  con- 
fidence of  the  intelligent  and  wealthy  section  of  the  Church 
its  mission  is  to  serve,  as  also  in  conciliating  general  good- 
will, constrains  belief  that,  with  fidelity  in  work  and  wisdom 
in  administration,  advancing  years  will  adequately  minister 
to  every  want  these  years  may  bring. 


9* 


202  Eakly-  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTEK  YIII. 

ALLEGHENY    COLLEGE.* 

BY  A.    W.   CUMMINQS,  D.D.,  LL.D. 

In  the  spring  of  1815  Eev.  Timotlij  Alden  removed  from 
the  city  of  New  York  to  Meadville,  Pa.  A  short  time  after 
his  arrival  he  explained,  to  a  meeting  of  the  citizens,  that  his 
principal  object  in  coming  to  the  West  was  to  select  a  suita- 
able  location  for  a  college.  The  meeting  highly  approved 
of  the  location  of  such  an  institution  at  Meadville.  From 
the  fact  that  the  region  to  be  benefited  by  the  institution  is 
principally  watered  by  the  numerous  streams  which  make 
the  Allegheny,  it  was  recommended  to  call  the  proposed 
seminary 

ALLEGHENY   COLLEGE. 

It  was  agreed  that  in  due  time  the  institution  consist  of 
president,  vice-president,  professors  and  tutors  ;  that  Rev. 
Timothy  Alden,  late  of  the  city  of  New  York,  be  the  presi- 
dent, and  professor  of  oriental  languages  and  ecclesiastical 
history ;  that  Eev.  Robert  Johnston  be  the  vice-president, 
and  professor  of  logic,  metaphysics,  and  ethics ;  and  that  they 
be  the  sole  instructors  for  the  present  in  all  departments  of 
literature  and  science. 

These  resolves,  of  that  little  meeting  on  the  evening  of 
that  spring  day,  1815,  settled  the  policy  of  a  great  under- 
taking, and  President  Alden,  to  whom  toil   and  privation 

*  Condensed  from  Warners,  Bears,  &  Co.'s  "  History  of  Crawford  County, 
Pa.,"  with  permiss'on  of  the  publishers. 


Allegheny  College.  203 

and  patient  waiting  was  a  real  joy,  soon  started  on  liis  mis- 
sion to  collect  the  means  to  make  effective  the  plans  thus 
laid.  He  ranged  through  the  principal  towns  of  the  North, 
receiving  donations,  varying  from  twenty  cents,  all  along  to 
$5,  $10,  and  $100,  in  casli,  and  a  gift  of  five  hundred  acres 
of  land  by  D.  D.  Rogers,  Esq.  The  first  name  on  his  paper 
was  John  Adams,  ex-President  of  the  United  States,  who 
gave  $20.  Sixty-six  of  the  solid  men  of  Boston  followed, 
among  them  the  Chantiings,  the  Davises,  the  Frothing- 
hams,  the  Lorings,  the  Lowells,  the  Ticknors,  the  Greenleafs, 
the  Parkmans,  and  the  Thayers.  Then  follow  the  men  of  Cam- 
bridge, Charlestown,  Dorchester,  Salem,  Marblehead,  Med- 
ford,  Plymouth,  etc.  Rhode  Island,  Kew  York,  Pennsylvania, 
and  other  States  were  visited.  The  net  results  of  this  mis- 
sion were :  land  valued  at  $2,000 ;  books,  $1,640  30 ;  cash, 
$461 ;  total,  $4,103  30.  A  rather  small  amount  of  cash  with 
which  to  found  a  college;  but  the  real  results  of  this  tour 
are  not  represented  by  these  figures,  for  he  paved  the  way  for 
bequests  that  were  princely.  Among  the  donors  are  names 
that  should  be  perpetuated ;  the  learned  Dr.  Worcester,  of 
Salem,  and  Dr.  Aaron  Bancroft  were  donors,  as  was  Dr. 
Harris,  president  of  Columbia  College.  Dr.  Nott,  of  Union 
College,  and  Brown  and  Ives,  the  patrons  of  Brown  Univer- 
sity, gave  $50  in  cash.  While  President  Alden  was  absent 
on  this  mission  east,  the  treasurer's  books  were  opened  in 
Meadville,  and  the  following  subscriptions  were  obtained : 
Major  Roger  Alden,  Hon.  John  B.  Wallace,  and  Hon. 
William  Griffith,  each  $500;  Samuel  Lord  and  Daniel  Le- 
Fevre,  two  hundred  and  twenty-five  acres  of  land  valued  at 
$450 ;  Dr.  Daniel  Bemus,  H.  J.  Iluidckoper,  Daniel  LeFevre, 
General  David  Mead,  Hon.  Jesse  Moore,  John  Reynolds,  and 
Jared  Shattuck,  each  $300;  Hon.  Patrick  Fan-elly,  Samuel 


204     .  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

B.  Magaw,  Colonel  Kalpli  Marlin,  and  James  White,  each 
$200;  Samuel  Torbett,  $150;  Eev.  Timothy  Alden,  $120 
(in  books) ;  Joseph  T.  Cummings  &  Co.,  $110 ;  Thomas  At- 
kinson and  Henry  Hurst,  each  $100 ;  Eliphalet  Bett,  $75 ; 
James  Foster,  $60;  Daniel  Perkins,  $05;  Moses  Allen, 
James  Hamilton,  Hev.  Robert  Johnston,  Joseph  Morrison, 
Alexander  M'Dowell,  Alexander  Power,  and  William  W. 
White,  each  $50;  John  Cotton,  $40;  Lewis  JSTeill,  $35; 
David  Compton,  $30 ;  John  Johnston  and  Noah  Wade, 
each  $20 ;  Hugh  Cotton  and  Hugh  Cotton,  Jr.,  each  $10 ; 
total,  $5,685,  whicli,  added  to  the  amount  of  $4,103  30, 
collected  by  President  Alden,  made  up  a  grand  total  of 
$9,788  30. 

When  we  consider  that  Crawford  County  was  then  but 
sparsely  settled,  and  its  people  not  yet  recovered  from  the 
war  of  1812,  we.  must  confess  that  this  subscription  exhibits 
a  spirit  of  generous  enterprise  and  rare  liberality. 

The  securing  of  a  charter  was  vigorously  pushed,  but  it 
encountered  delay,  and  did  not  become  a  law  until  March 
24,  1817.  The  act  of  incorporation  ordains  the  establish- 
ment of  an  institution  for  the  education  of  youth  in  the 
learned,  ancient,  and  modern  languages,  in  the  liberal  arts 
and  sciences,  and  in  all  useful  literature ;  with  power  to 
"  confer  on  the  pupils  of  said  institution  such  rewards,  di- 
plomas, and  degrees  in  the  different  liberal  arts  and  sciences, 
as  the  faculty  and  trustees  shall  think  them  entitled  to  ;  and 
to  confer  honorary  degrees  according  to  the  general  usages 
and  customs  of  other  colleges."  The  same  act  appropriated 
to  the  college  the  sum  of  $2,000,  and  a  further  sum  of 
$5,000  was  subsequently  granted  by  the  State.  The  charter 
members  of  the  board  of  trustees  were  selected  from  the 
counties  of  Crawford,  Erie,  Yenango,  Mercer,  Butler,  Beaver, 


Allegheny  College.  205 

Allegheny,  Westmoreland,  and  Dauphin,  and  the  city  of 
Philadelphia,  besides  others  from  Ohio,  New  Jersey,  and 
Massachusetts.  Those  residing  in  Crawford  County  were : 
Eoger  Alden,  William  M' Arthur,  Jesse  Moore,  John  Brooks, 
William  Clark,  Henry  Hurst,  Sanmel  Lord,  Samuel  Torbett, 
Ealph  Marlin,  Patrick  Farrelly,  Thomas  Atkinson,  John 
Eeynolds,  Daniel  Bemus,  William  Foster,  Daniel  Perkins, 
Kcvs.  Amos  Chase,  Timothy  Alden,  and  Robert  Johnston. 

On  J::ly  4,  1817,  the  charter  was  formally  accepted,  and 
under  its  provisions  a  complete  organization  was  effected. 
On  July  25,  amid  much  ceremony,  was  held  the  first 
annual  commencement  of  the  embryo  institution,  at  which 
time  Rev.  Timothy  Alden  was  inaugurated  president  of 
the  faculty,  and  professor  of  the  oriental  languages, 
ecclesiastical  history,  and  theology,  of  Allegheny  College. 
The  inaugural  ceremonies  took  place  in  the  old  log  court- 
house. It  will  astonish  many  of  the  scliolars  of  to-day  to 
read  the  programme  of  exercises  on  this  occasion:  "1.  An 
address  in  Latin,  to  the  president  and  professor,  announcing 
his  appointment  to  these  offices,  by  Patrick  Farrelly,  Esq. 
2.  A  reply  in  Latin,  by  Mr.  Alden,  declaring  his  accept- 
ance of  these  offices.  3.  A  prayer  in  Latin,  by  Mr.  Alden. 
4.  Sacred  music,  by  a  choir  of  singers,  under  the  direction  of 
Colonel  Robert  Stockton  and  Mr.  John  Bowman.  5.  Inau- 
gural oration  in  Latin,  by  Mr.  Alden.  6.  A  Hebrew  oration, 
an  English  oration,  a  Latin  dialogue,  an  English  dialogue, 
and  an  English  oration,  by  the  probationers  of  Allegheny 
College.  7.  Sacred  music.  8.  An  address  in  English,  in  ref- 
erence to  the  occasion,  by  Mr.  Alden."  It  is  not  surprising 
that  Sherman  Day,  in  his  '*  Historical  Collection,"  should 
make  the  following  comment  regarding  this  programme : 
"  Mr.  Alden  was  inaugurated  amid  an  astonishing  display  of 


206  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

the  dead  languages.  It  should  be  observed  that  the  lower 
story  of  the  court-house  was  the  county  jail,  and,  therefore, 
the  prisoners  must  have  had  the  benefit  of  this  intellectual 
treat.  The  college  opened  in  the  court-house,  which  it  occu- 
pied for  a  brief  period,  then  removed  to  a  frame  building, 
near  the  south-east  corner  of  Walnut  Street  and  the  Dia- 
mond ;  and  thence  to  a  frame  building  on  Pine  Street,  now 
the  residence  of  Eobert  M'Mullen. 

BXnLDING  AND  GROUND. 

In  due  time  a  college  building  was  commenced.  Five 
acres  of  ground  were  donated  by  Samuel  Lord,  and  the 
present  beautiful  site  in  the  northern  suburbs  of  the  city  was 
selected  for  the  rising  institution.  The  corner-stone  of 
Bentley  Hall  (so  named  in  honor  of  Rev.  William  Bent- 
ley,  D.D.,  LL.D.),  the  first  public  building  of  Allo^gheny 
College,  was  laid  in  the  presence  of  a  large  assemblage  of 
the  people  of  Crawford  and  adjoining  counties  on  July  5, 
1820.  Few  are  i^ow  living  who  witnessed  the  imposing 
ceremonies.  Even  the  names  of  many  prominent  in  the 
duties  of  that  day  are  unknown  to  the  larger  portion  of 
the  present  residents  of  Crawford  County ;  but  the  monu- 
ment of  their  philanthropy  remains  a  blessing  to  the  present 
and  to  future  generations.  Eev.  President  Timothy  Alden, 
after  being  appointed  the  Worshipful  Master,  pro  tempore^ 
of  Western  Star  Lodge  of  Free  and  Accepted  Masons,  under 
whose  auspices  the  stone  was  laid,  gave  the  history  of  several 
articles  which  w^ere  deposited  in  the  stone. 

These  consisted  of  a  silver  plate,  four  by  six  inches  in  size, 
handsomely  wrought  and  engraved  by  Captain  Jacob  Hull, 
and  presented  by  him  for  the  purpose  ;  a  bottle  containing 
foreign  and  domestic  coins;  a  concise  history  of  Alleglieny 


Allegheny  College.  207 

College  ;  sundry  small  rolls  of  parchments,  exhibiting  lists 
of  the  names  of  the  benefactors  and  officers  of  the  college, 
and  of  the  members  and  officers  of  the  Western  Star  Lodge 
and  Chapter ;  several  newspapers  giving  notices  of  the  pro- 
ceedings of  the  board  of  trustees ;  a  piece  of  Plymouth 
Eock  ;  a  piece  of  marble  broken  from  a  pillar  which  tradition 
states  to  have  belonged  to  Queen  Dido's  temple  in  ancient 
Carthage ;  a  specimen  of  plaster  from  the  tomb  of  Yirgil, 
presented  by  J.  H.  Steele,  M.D.,  of  the  United  States  Kavy  ; 
and  specimens  of  the  reeds  laid  three  thousand  years  ago 
between  the  bricks  in  the  pyramids,  presented  by  Captain 
David  Molthrop,  whose  son  William  accompanied  Captain 
Austin  on  his  expedition  to  the  Euphrates  in  1816,  and 
brought  those  curiosities  of  antiquity  to  America.  After 
consigning  these  several  articles  to  the  receptacle  awaiting 
them,  Dr.  Alden  sprinkled  the  stone  with  corn,  wine,  and  oil, 
according  to  Masonic  custom,  and  pronounced  it  "  well  laid 
and  sure."  Then,  kneeling  down,  he  supplicated  the  bless- 
ing of  Heaven  on  the  work  undertaken,  and  on  the  benefac- 
tors, officers,  instructors,  and  alurrtni  of  the  institution  of  the 
present  and  all  future  generations,  and  on  the  large  assem- 
blage convened  on  the  occasion.  He  then  addressed  the  peo- 
ple, reciting  briefly  the  growth,  progress,  and  hopeful  out- 
look of  the  college,  whose  charming  location  overlooking  the 
valley  of  French  Creek  seemed  destined  by  nature  to  be  the 
site  of  a  flourishing  scliool,  devoted  to  the  interests  of  the 
literary,  scientific,  and  moral  welfare  of  the  community. 

This  being  the  anniversary  Commencement  of  Allegheny 
College,  the  appropriate  exercises  of  the  day  took  place 
around  the  corner-stone,  over  which  was  erected  an  arched 
bower  decorated  with  flowers,  prepared  by  the  young  ladies 
of  Meadvillc.     Of  the  students  wlio  took  part  in  that  Com- 


208  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

mencement  Day,  more  than  sixty-four  3^ears  ago,  but  one 
survives,  David  M.  Farrelly,  Esq.,  the  senior  member  of  the 
Crawford  County  Bar,  though  Hon.  David  Derickson,  the 
orator  of  the  occasion,  has  only  recently  passed  from  the 
scenes  of  life.  Taking  into  consideration  the  fact,  that  the 
population  of  Meadville  was  tlien  but  six  hundred  and  sixty- 
six,  and  of  the  whole  county  nine  thousand  three  hundred 
and  ninety-seven,  a  proper  conception  may  be  realized  of  the 
magnitude  of  the  undertaking,  and  of  the  public  spirit  and 
liberality  of  the  pioneer  fathers. 

President  Alden's  untiring  zeal  and  enterprise  convinced 
people  that  his  project  would  succeed,  and  that  it  was  wor- 
thy of  their  benefactions.  To  the  scholarly  mind  of  Dr.  Al- 
den  the  ideal  of  a  first-class  college  embraced  the  necessary 
feature  of  a  great  library,  and  to  realize  this  called  forth  his 
most  earnest  exertions.  In  happily  securing  such  a  collection 
of  books  as  had  few  superiors  in  the  country,  at  that  time, 
the  scheme  of  establishing  the  college  seemed  measurably 
assured  of  success.  The  first  large  contribution  was  be- 
queathed at  his  death,  January  29, 1820,  by  the  Rev.  William 
Bentley,  of  Salem,  Mass.,  who,  says  the  historian  Day,  had 
spent  his  life  in  amassing  one  of  the  most  rare  collections  of 
theological  works  in  the  country. 

Harvard  University  had  set  her  eyes  upon  this  collection, 
and,  having  bestowed  the  preliminary  plum,  in  the  shape  of 
an  LL.D.  diploma,  patiently  awaited  the  doctor's  demise.  She 
occupied,  however,  the  situation  of  Esau  before  Isaac ;  for 
Dr.  Alden  had  prepared  the  savory  dish,  and  received  the  boon 
and  the  name ;  Bentley  Hall  now  records  the  gratitude  of 
Allegheny  College.  This  collection  embraced  all  his  theolog- 
ical books.  It  is  said  to  have  contained  such  a  treasure  of  the 
ancient  Latin  and  Greek  Fathers  of  the  Church  as  few  of  the 


Allegheny  College.  209 

colleges  of  the  United  States  possessed — all  his  lexicons  and 
]3i[)les— and  was  valued  at  $3,000.  Isaiah  Thomas,  LL.D., 
of  Worcester,  Mass.,  also  donated  a  considerable  collection 
of  miscellaneous  literature,  valued  at  $750.  Then  came  the 
most  important  bequest  of  all,  that  of  Hon.  James  Win- 
throp,  LL.D.,  of  Cambridge,  Mass.,  who,  as  the  "  Boston 
Patriot "  of  that  day  said,  has  bequeathed  his  library,  one  of 
the  best  private  libraries  in  the  Union,  to  the  Allegheny 
College  at  Meadville,  where  the  late  learned  and  reverend, 
and,  we  will  add,  uniformly  patriotic,  Dr.  Bentley  sent  a  part 
of  his  very  valuable  collection.  The  Winthrop  collection, 
containing  three  thousand  one  hundred  and  fifty  volumes, 
was  a  most  rare  and  costly  one,  and  was  valued  at  $6,400. 

The  library  was  increased  to  eiglit  thousand  volumes,  val- 
ued at  $20,000,  by  the  labors  of  President  Alden.  It  was 
mentioned  by  ex-Presidents  Thomas  Jefferson  and  James 
Madison  as  a  most  valuable  collection  of  books.  Through 
the  influence  of  Dr.  Alden  donations  of  land  were  received, 
increasing  the  campus  from  five  to  ten  acres. 

In  the  meantime  adverse  influences  had  begun  to  operate 
against  the  institution,  which  tended  to  check  its  growth  and 
jeopardize  its  existence.  Within  the  bounds  of  the  Pres- 
byterian Synod  of  Pittsburg,  which  embraced,  including 
Washington  County  on  the  south,  all  of  north-western  Penn- 
sylvania, were  already  two  colleges  under  Presbyterian  pat- 
ronage— Jefferson  and  Washington — one  or  the  other  of 
which  nearly  all  the  Presbyterian  ministers  of  the  region 
claimed  as  their  alma  mater.  A  general  sentiment  pre- 
vailed among  tliem  that  if  Allegheny  College  succeeded  it 
nmst  be  at  the  expense  of  those  already  established,  neither 
of  which  had  adequate  support.  They,  therefore,  withheld 
their  approval   in   documentary   form   when   assembled   in 


210  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

presbytery,  and  for  the  most  part  their  individual  influence 
in  their  own  congregations  ;  hence,  students  were  too  few 
to  support  instructors,  and,  upon  the  resignation  of  President 
Alden,  in  ^N^ovember,  1831,  all  operations  were  suspended 
and  the  college  closed.  Thus,  after  sixteen  years  of  inde- 
fatigable labor  and  self-sacrifice,  the  indomitable  spirit  of 
Dr.  Alden  was  broken  ;  but  so  long  as  time  shall  last  his  name 
will  be  handed  down  from  generation  to  generation  as  the 
founder  of  Allegheny  College. 

For  two  years  succeeding  Dr.  Alden's  resignation  the  col- 
lege stood  a  silent  monument  of  noble  but  unsuccessful 
efforts  in  the  cause  of  literature  and  science.  In  the  mean- 
time an  interchange  of  sentiment  took  place  between  the 
trustees  and  some  ministers  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church,  having  for  its  object  an  arrangement  for  securing  to 
the  institution  the  patronage  of  the  Pittsburg  Conference. 

The  Conference  met  at  Meadville  in  July,  1833.  The 
board  of  trustees,  through  an  accredited  agent,  tendered  the 
college  to  the  Conference.  After  visiting  the  institution  and 
examining  its  library  and  other  property,  the  Conference  re- 
solved unanimously  to  accept  the  proposition  of  the  board  of 
trustees  by  taking  the  institution  under  its  patronage.  It 
w^as  also  resolved  to  make  an  effort  to  raise  an  endowment  of 
$20,000  to  aid  in  sustaining  the  college,  and  to  found  a 
Roberts  professorship,  in  honor  of  the  venerable  Bishop  R. 
R.  Roberts,  then  presiding. 

The  following  faculty  w^as  elected  under  the  new^  organiza- 
tion :  Martin  Ruter,  D.D.,  president,  and  professor  of  moral 
science;  Rev.  Homer  J.  Clark,  A.M.,  vice-president,  and 
professor  of  mathematics ;  Augustus  Ruter,  A.B.,  professor 
of  languages.  Between  twenty  and  thirty  students  were  en- 
rolled on  opening  day,  November  4, 1833. 


Allegheny  College.  211 

From  that  day  lier  growth  and  prosperity  have  kept  pace 
with  the  best  institutions  of  the  land.  President  Enter  was 
a  man  of  hirge  attainments,  of  successful  experience  in 
schools,  first  at  Newmarket,  N.  H.,  afterward  at  Augusta 
College,  Ky.  Dr.  Enter  remained  at  the  helm  but  four 
years ;  at  the  close  of  each  a  small  class  finished  the  curric- 
ulum, and  took  the  bachelor's  degree.  Homer  J.  Clark, 
D.D.,  became  president  in  1837 ;  and  from  1838  to  1844 
State  aid,  to  the  amount  of  $1,000  annually,  was  regularly 
received,  and  the  college  was  prosperous.  But  upon  the 
withdrawal  of  the  State  largess  the  college  was  suspended 
for  one  year,  1844.  Dr.  Clark  spent  that  year  soliciting  aid 
from  the  people.  He  received  during  the  year  and  safely 
invested  $60,000.  He  originated  the  successful  "  scholar- 
ship plan,"  which  allows  students  free  tuition  in  all  depart- 
ments, and  secures  to  the  college  a  corresponding  income. 

In  1847  John  Barker,  D.D.,  was  made  president.  He  was 
a  man  of  strong  mind  and  of  varied  learning ;  and  prosperity 
attended  the  college  during  his  administration.  Enter  Hall, 
a  three-story  brick  structure  east  of  the  main  building,  at 
a  cost  of  $6,000,  was  completed  during  his  administration, 
which  terminated  by  his  sudden  death,  of  apoplexy,  in  1860. 
The  next  president  was  George  Loomis,  D.D.,  an  alumnus 
of  the  Wesley  an  University,  of  large  experience  as  a  popular 
professor  in  several  institutions. 

During  the  administration  of  Dr.  Loomis  a  new  building 
was  erected,  accommodating  over  one  hundred  students  with 
good  rooms.  It  took  fire  and  was  consumed  in  December, 
1882.  Dr.  Loomis  also  secured  good  additions  to  the  invest- 
ed funds.  After  the  retirement  of  Dr.  Loomis,  Jonathan 
Ilamnett,  D.D.,  acted  as  president  for  one  year. 

L.  II.  Bugbee,  D.D.,  was  inaugurated  president  June  24, 


212  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

1875.  He  was  graduated  from  Amherst  College  in  1854.  His 
long  and  varied  experience  in  sch(5ols  of  various  grades,  male 
and  female,  as  well  as  mixed,  well  prepared  liim  for  his  suc- 
cessful presidency  at  Allegheny  College.  Great  improve- 
ments were  made  in  the  buildings  by  extensive  repairs,  and 
Hulings  Hall,  the  gift  of  Marcus  Hulings,  was  opened  as  a 
home  for  lady  students  in  1 881.  It  is  the  most  elegant  of 
the  college  buildings. 

In  1882  Dr.  Bugbee  retired,  his  position  becoming  un- 
pleasant in  consequence  of  a  want  of  harmony  in  the  board 
and  faculty.  He  died  in  Geneva,  K.  Y.,  in  1883.  Dr.  Ham- 
nett  again  served  as  president  jpro  tempore  while  the  board 
was  looking  for  a  successor  to  the  lamented  Dr.  Bugbee. 
The  choice  fell  upon  David  H.  Wheeler,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  who, 
like  his  predecessor,  had  long  been  connected  with  prosperous 
schools,  and  had  also  been  eight  for  years  the  editor  of  ''  The 
Methodist,"  an  independent  Methodist  weekly  newspaper  of 
large  circulation  published  in  New  York  city.  Dr.  Wheeler 
has  been  president  for  two  years.  The  usual  prosperity  has 
been  enjoyed  by  the  institution. 

Under  Methodist  control  Allegheny  has  prospered  for  more 
than  half  a  century.  The  invested  funds  exceed  $160,000; 
other  property  is  valued  at  $160,000  ;  total,  $320,000. 

Its  alumni  exceeds  seven  hundred  names.  Among  these 
are:  Hons.  David  Derickson,  John  W.  Farrelly,  William 
Reynolds,  Darwin  A.  Finney,  Pearson  Church,  Rev.  Calvin 
Kingsley,  D.D.,  Bishop  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church ; 
Hon.  F.  H.  Piei-pont,  ex-Governor  of  West  Virginia ;  Revs. 
Moses  Crow,  M. A.,  D.D.,  Sandford  Hunt,  M.A.,  D.D.,  Alex- 
ander Martin,  M.A.,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  president  of  Asbury  Uni- 
versity, Greencastle,  Ind. ;  O.  N.  Hartshorn,  M.A.,  LL.D., 
president  of  Mount  Union  College,  Ohio;  James  Marvin, 


Allegheny  College.  213 

M.  A.,  D.D.,  president  of  La^vrence  University,  Kansas ; 
Albert  L.  Long,  M. A.,  D.D.,  professor  in  Kobert  College,  Con- 
stantinople, Turkey;  J.  Walter  Waugh,  M.A.,  and  James 
M.  Thoburn,  M.A.,  D.D.,  missionaries  in  India;  Milton  B. 
Goff,  M.A.,  Pli.D.,  president  of  the  Western  Pennsylvania 
Uuivei-sity;  and  W.  G.  Williams,  A.M.,  late  principal  of 
Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary,  and  many  others  well  known. 
In  all  departments  of  life,  civil  and  military,  at  home  and  in 
distant  lands,  Allegheny  College  is  honored  by  the  record 
made  for  her  in  the  lives  and  deaths  of  those  whom  she 
proudly  calls  her  own.  At  present  nearly  the  entire  body 
of  students  is  regularly  drilled  in  tactics,  and  instructed  in 
military  science.  The  signal  gun,  fired  at  sunrise,  arouses 
the  sleepers  of  the  entire  city,  and  awakens  the  echoes  far 
down  the  valley  and  up  the  dark  ravines. 


214  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTEK  IX. 

WESTERN    RESEllVE    SEMINARY. 

BY  REV.   E.   A.    WHITWAM,    A.M. 

This  institution,  located  at  West  Farmington,  O.,  is  among 
the  oldest  in  the  State.  It  was  at  first  managed  by  a  stock 
company,  under  the  name  of  Farmington  Academy,  and 
opened  in  1833,  in  a  small  brick  building.  In  1849  the 
present  fine  central  building  was  erected,  and  the  name  was 
changed  to  Farmington  Normal  School.  With  the  hope  of 
greater  usefulness,  and  to  secure  means  to  liquidate  the  debt 
incurred  for  the  new  building,  the*  trustees,  in  1852,  tendered 
the  school,  with  all  its  assets  and  liabilities,  to  the  Erie  Con- 
ference of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  Though  the 
negotiations  were  not  fully  closed,  Rev.  James  Greer,  A.M., 
was  appointed,  by  Bishop  Simpson,  from  the  Conference  as 
principal  of  the  school.  The  next  year  Mr.  Greer  was  re-ap- 
pointed by  Bishop  Baker,  and  Eev.  John  C.  Ayres  was  ap- 
pointed agent  from  the  Conference.  In  1854  the  name  of  the 
school  became  Western  Reserve  Seminary. 

Mr.  Greer  continued  the  principal,  but  the  agency  from 
the  Conference  was  discontinued  for  a  year.  Mr.  Greer  con- 
tinued at  the  head  of  the  seminary  until  1861,  wiien  he  was 
succeeded  by  Rev.  William  D.  Archibold,  A.M.,  who  had 
rendered  five  years'  good  service  in  the  school  as  professor  of 
languages  previous  to  his  election  to  the  principalship.  In 
1868  two  boarding  halls  were  erected.  The  one  for  gentle- 
men is  two  stories  high,  seventy  by  thirty-four  feet,  and  pro- 


Western  Reserve  Seminary.  215 

vides  rooms  for  fifty  young  men.  The  other,  for  ladies,  is  a 
very  superior  edifice,  three  stories  high,  and  eighty-four  by 
thirty  feet  on  the  ground.  It  is  the  gift  of  Rev.  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  J.  B.  Corey,  of  the  East  Ohio  Conference.  The  pres- 
ent principal  succeeded  Rev.  A.  E.  M'Bride,  A.M.,  in  1884. 
The  prospects  of  the  school  were  never  brighter  than  now. 
The  curriculum  has  been  thoroughly  revised,  bringing  it  up 
to  the  latest  standards  in  the  best  schools.  There  are  seven 
courses  of  study,  each  leading  to  its  appropriate  degree. 
Western  Reserve  Seminary  is  a  child  of  the  Church.  With 
no  sectarian  bias,  each  student  feels  that  the  atmosphere  of 
the  school  is  religious.  A  constant  religious  influence  is  felt 
among  the  students.  In  such  circumstances  discipline  is 
easy,  and  devotion  to  study  is  insured.  Ladies  and  gentle- 
men enter  the  same  classes,  are  candidates  for  the  same  hon- 
ors, and  the  presence  and  influence  of  each  is  an  inspiration 
to  the  other.  Mutual  sympathy  and  respect  unite  teachers 
and  students  more  like  one  family  than  simply  as  a  school. 
The  institution  being  on  the  Painesville  and  Youngstown  Rail- 
road, is  very  accessible  to  the  people  of  the  Western  Reserve 
and  of  other  parts  of  the  State.  It  is  the  only  Methodist 
school  in  north-eastern  Ohio,  and  in  this  territory  there  is 
but  one  other  having  authority  to  confer  degrees.  It  is  now 
doing  college  work,  and  many  think  that  in  name,  as  well  as 
in  work,  it  should  be  known  as  a  college.  This  subject  is 
now  before  the  board  of  trustees. 

The  ladies  are  under  the  special  charge  of  the  preceptress, 
but  meet  the  gentlemen  at  the  recitations  and  lectures,  in  the 
chapel,  and  at  the  tables  in  the  common  boarding  hall.  The 
moral  tone  of  the  village  is  high.  Public  opinion  has 
thwarted  all  attempts  to  introduce  saloons,  billiards,  or  other 
forms  of  gambling.     If  there  are  tipplers  in  the  place,  they 


216  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

must  go  four  miles  away  from  the  village  to  secure  the  means 
of  gratifying  tlieir  appetites. 

The  three  principal  buildings  and  grounds  are  estimated  at 
$20,000,  and  there  is  a  small  endowment  of  $2,700,  with 
$2,300  more  pledged.  The  enrollment  for  the  last  year  was 
one  hundred  and  lifty-six ;  with  ten  thousand,  three  hundred 
and  fifty  from  the  beginning.  Many  of  these  have  filled 
honorable  places  in  the  various  professions,  in  churches,  and 
the  business  enterprises  of  the  country.  The  school  has 
always  been  in  charge  of  an  able,  faithful  board  of  instruct- 
ors, and  has  been  a  constant  blessing  to  the  "  Western  Re- 
serve." The  people  are  now  becoming  wealthy,  and  they 
should  endow  this  institution  so  liberally  as  to  insure  its 
success  in  all  coming  years. 

The  teachers  now  in  the  school  are :  Eev.  E.  A.  Whitwam, 
A.M.,  president ;  Mrs.  O.  A.  Whitwam,  M.L.A. ;  Miss  Sara 
A.  Collins,  A.M. ;  Mr.  Harry  Allen ;  Mr.  O.  A.  Burnette ; 
Miss  R.  Effie  Farley. 


NoKWALK  Seminary.  217 


CHAPTER  X. 

NORWALK      SEMINARY.* 

BY  EDWARD  THOMSON,  A.M.,  PH.D. 

At  an  early  day  an  enterprising  colony  from  Connecticut 
settled  in  Huron  County,  O.  The  village  founded  by  them 
took  the  name  of  their  old  New  England  home,  Norwalk. 
Being  a  cultivated  people,  of  education  and  piety,  a  school 
for  their  children  became  a  first  necessity.  They  founded 
*' Norwalk  Academy"  at  about  1825.  With  the  hope  of  ex- 
tending its  usefulness  under  the  inspiring  influence  of  that 
sterling  evangelist,  Rev.  Henry  O.  Sheldon,  this  school  was 
tendered  to  the  Oliio  Conference,  in  the  year  1833,  and  Rev. 
Jonathan  E.  Chaplin  became  its  principal.  He  was  born  in 
Chaplin,  Windham  County,  Conn.,  in  1789.  While  he  was 
quite  young  his  parents  removed  to  the  State  of  New  York, 
lie  studied  law,  and  for  a  time  practiced  at  BiifF<ilo.  He 
wrote  and  published  a  pamphlet,  under  the  title  "  True 
Glory,"  in  defense  of  the  famous  Hartford  Convention. 
This  fastened  upon  him,  among  his  legal  confreres^  the  sou- 
hriquet  '*  True  Glory."  During  the  war  of  1812,  Mr.  Chap- 
lin served  as  aid-dc  camp  to  General  Porter  on  the  North- 
ern frontier,  and  fell  into  intemperate  habits.  After  the 
war  he  removed  to  Urbana,  O.  A  terrible  cyclone  passed 
over  the  place,  sweeping  away  every  thing  in  its  coui*se, 
except    his    cabin.      So    wonderful    a   providence    greatly 

•  The  first  part  of  this  article  was  written  for  this  work  ;  the  latter  part  \% 
copied,  by  permissioi),  from    the  "Life   of  Bisliop   Thomson."      Cincinnati: 
Cranston  &  8towe. 
10 


218  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

affected  liim,  resulting  in  his  conversion  and  consecration  to 
the  ministry.  He  became  a  noted  temperance  worker.  His 
lectures  were  sometimes  like  a  tempest  (says  Kev.  W.  H. 
Eaper),  sweeping  every  thing  before  them.  Scores  in  the 
judicial  circuit  where  he  practiced  law  were  reclaimed  from 
intemperance  by  his  irresistible  appeals.  Bishop  Harris  says 
he  was  the  best  classical  scholar  he  ever  knew.  His  fame  as 
a  scholar  and  refined  Christian  gentlemen  reached  the  trust- 
ees of  the  Conference  Seminary  at  Nor  walk.  They  elected 
him  its  principal  in  1834.  The  next  year  he  joined  the 
Oliio  Conference,  but  continued  at  the  seminary. 

The  school  was  prosperous,  with  an  average  attendance  of 
over  one  hundred  students.  Among  Mr.  Chaplin's  pupils 
were  some  who,  in  after  years,  became  widely  known  and 
very  distinguished.  In  this  list  is  Bishop  W.  L.  Harris,  John 
H.  Pitzel,  George  W.  Brown,  all  living ;  George  W.  Breck- 
enridge,  Thomas  BarkduU,  and  others.  Among  the  early 
teachers  at  Norwalk  Seminary  were  Mr.  Darwell  and  Misses 
Langford  and  Loveland.  In  1836  the  seminary  building  was 
destroyed  by  fire — a  heavy  loss  to  the  trustees  and  conmm- 
nity.  The  school  was,  however,  continued  in  extemporized 
accommodations.  Immediate  measures  were  taken  to  rebuild 
on  a  larger  scale.  After  the  fire  Mr.  Chaplin  resigned,  and 
spent  several  years  in  the  active  work  of  the  ministry.  His 
hist  work  was  in  the  office  of  president  of  the  Wliite  Pigeon 
branch  of  the  State  University  of  Michigan.  Here  he  died 
a  most  triumphant  death  in  September,  1846.  His  successor 
at  Norwalk  Seminary  was  Bev.  Edward  Thomson,  M.D., 
better  known  as  Bishop  Tliomson,  D.D.,  LL.D.  At  the 
Conference  of  1838,  held  at  Tiffin,  O.,  Dr.  Thomson  was 
a]^pointed  principal  of  Norwalk  Seminary.  Here  he  be- 
gan his  literary  career  and  work  as  an  educator,  for  wliich 


NoRWALK  Seminary.  219 

he  seems  to  have  been  especially  fitted  by  nature  and  by 
grace,  and  in  which  he  was  destined  to  achieve  such  brilliant 
success.  Some  of  his  friends  felt  that  he  ought  not  to  leave 
the  pastorate,  and  that  he  was  not  qualified  for  the  place, 
since  he  had  never  been  a  teacher  of  youth.  lie,  however 
entered  upon  the  duties  of  the  position  with  a  modest  yet 
cheeiful  confidence  in  his  ability  to  achieve  success.  He 
knew,  perhaps,  better  than  anj'  one  else,  what  he  lacked  of 
the  requisite  qualifications,  and  applied  himself  diligently  to 
the  study  of  those  branches  of  learning  with  which  he  was 
not  sufficiently  familiar ;  and  with  close  thought,  quick  per- 
ception, retentive  memory,  and  untiring  application  he  be- 
came well  rounded  in  all  the  departments  of  scholastic  knowl- 
edge. And  thus  he  pursued  his  studies,  ever  adding  to  his 
stock  of  literary  and  scientific  acquisitions,  and  never  for- 
getting what  he  had  learned.  He  made  himself  proficient 
in  helles-lettres  and  psychology,  two  departments  in  which 
he  was  especially  interested  ;  but  whatever  he  studied  he 
mastered. 

It  was  late  in  the  autumn  of  1838  that  Dr.  Thomson  went 
to  Norwalk.  Alexander  Nelson,  afterward  a  traveling 
preacher,  and  now  an  honored  member  of  the  North  Oliio 
Conference,  worthily  bearing  the  title  of  Doctor  of  Divinity, 
accompanied  him  as  assistant  teacher.  To  Dr.  Nelson  the 
author  is  indebted  for  many  facts,  hereafter  stated,  relative 
to  the  seminary. 

The  opening  of  the  school  had  been  delayed  because  the 
new  building  was  not  ready  for  occupancy.  The  edifice 
was  forty  by  eighty  feet,  three  stories  high.  The  two  sec- 
tions on  the  lower  floor  contained  each  a  school-room  and 
two  recitation-rooms.  In  the  second  story  were  two  large 
roomy,  one  for  chapel  purposes,  the  other  for  the  ladies' 


220  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

classes.  The  third  story  was  divided  into  dormitories.  When 
the  new  teacliers  arrived  the  seminary  building  was  only 
inclosed ;  hence  the  school  term  had  to  be  opened  in  a 
private  dwelling.  The  pupils  at  first  were  twenty  or 
twenty-five  boys  from  the  village  of  Norwalk.  In  the  course 
of  two  months  the  school-room  in  the  west  wing  and  two 
recitation-rooms  wei'e  finished  and  furnished,  and  the  school 
was  transferred  to  the  new  building.  By  the  end  of  the  year 
the  entire  edifice  was  completed  and  occupied. 

In  the  autumn  of  1839  the  ladies'  department  was  opened, 
with  Mre.  A.  Nelson  as  preceptress,  and  Miss  A.  E.  Morri- 
son, her  sister,  as  assistant  —  ladies  of  superior  qualifi- 
cations, who  had  had  experience  in  teaching  in  the  Eastern 
States. 

The  seminary,  which  had  been  increasing  in  number  and 
in  popularity,  now  took  advanced  ground,  and  became  more 
generally  known  and  patronized.  The  catalogue  of  1842 
sums  up  the  number  of  two  hundred  and  sixty-five  male  and 
one  hundred  and  twenty-six  female  students,  making  the 
total  number  for  the  year  three  hundred  and  ninety-one. 
The  departments  of  teaching  at  first  took  wide  range,  all  the 
branches  of  study  being  attended  to  by  the  two  first  instruct- 
ors. Afterward,  as  teachers  were  added,  the  number  of 
branches  to  each  was  reduced.  Hence,  at  first,  Dr.  Thom- 
son's department  was  belles-lettres,  physics,  and  Latin ;  Mr. 
Nelson's  was  mathematics,  natural  science,  and  Greek. 
Thomas  J.  Pope,  an  advanced  scholar,  subsequently  a  mem- 
ber of  the  North  Ohio  Conference,  was  engaged  to  teach 
some  classes,  and  afterwai'd  James  Mitchell,  an  adept  in 
mathematics,  was  engaged,  and  E.  W.  Doan  was  made  an 
assistant  in  the  lower  English  branches.  H.  S.  Bradley  was 
soon  secured  to  occupy  tlic  cast  room  on  the  lower  floor.    lie 


NoRWALK  Seminary.  221 

subsequently  entered  tlie  ministry,  and  rose  to  great  useful- 
ness in  the  Central  Ohio  Conference. 

A  Mr.  Sayre,  a  graduate  of  Kenyon  College,  was  employed, 
but,  after  a  few  montlis,  he  took  a  fever  and  died.  Then  a 
Mr.  Olney,  a  graduate  of  Ohio  University,  was  engaged. 
After  a  short  time  he  resigned,  to  prepare  himself  for  the 
ministry  at  Lane  Seminary,  Cincinnati ;  but  he  died  before 
he  was  able  to  enter  upon  his  ministerial  duties.  Shortly 
after  this  Kev.  Ilolden  D wight,  a  graduate  from  the  Wes- 
leyan  University  at  Middletown,  Conn.,  and  wife,  experi- 
enced teachers  from  the  East,  came  to  Norwalk,  and  were 
added  to  the  teaching  force  at  the  seminary.  In  the  fall  of 
1842  Professor  Nelson  and  his  wife  received  an  urgent  call 
from  the  trustees  of  Worthington  Female  Seminary  to  come 
and  take  the  charge  of  that  institution,  which  was  under  the 
supervision  of  the  Ohio  Conference. 

After  due  deliberation  they  accepted  the  invitation,  ten- 
dered their  resignations  to  the  tmstees  of  Norwalk  Seminary, 
and  their  connection  with  the  latter  was  dissolved.  In  after 
years  Mr.  Nelson  entered  the  ministry,  and  became  a  popular 
pastor  on  the  most  important  stations.  He  was  twice  a  dele- 
gate to  the  General  Conference,  and,  wherever  he  was  placed, 
was  a  useful  instrument  in  the  hands  of  God.  Ilolden 
D wight  and  his  wife  took  the  places  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Nelson 
when  they  departed  for  Worthington.  For  a  few  months 
Mrs.  Thomson,  wife  of  the  principal,  acted  as  preceptress  and 
teacher  of  French.  The  trustees  at  this  time  were :  Timothy 
l>akcr,  Piatt  Benedict,  A.  E.  Sutton,  D.  Squire,  Thomas 
Dunn,  and  Walter  Osburn.  Tuition  was  $2  a  quarter  in  the 
primary  department;  higher  English,  $4;  mathematics,  $5  ; 
Latin  and  Greek,  §5;  French,  Spanish,  and  Italian,  S5 ;  orna- 
mental branches,  $5 ;  music,  piano,  $10.     An  historical  and 


222  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

geological  society  was  established  in  April,  1842,  witli 
•A.  Nelson,  president;  H.  Dwiglit,  secretary.  A  literary 
association,  known  as  the  "  Athenian  Society,"  was  formed 
among  the  students,  and,  for  a  series  of  years,  was  continued, 
with  great  profit  to  those  who  took  part  in  its  exercises. 
Among  those  who  composed  it  we  find  the  names  of  L.  A. 
Iline,  L.  B.  Otis,  W.  H.  Hopkins,  and  others,  who  subse- 
quently made  their  mark  upon  the  world  as  men  of  mind 
and  worth. 

In  1840  the  North  Ohio  Conference  was  organized,  and 
Dr.  Edward  Thomson  was  elected  its  first  secretary.  He 
was  well  qualified  for  such  a  position.  Accurate,  careful,  and 
an  excellent  penman,  all  his  minutes  were  well  kept.  He 
held  the  position  four  years,  and  then  declined  a  re-election. 

In  1842  the  Ohio  Wesley  an  University  was  chartered  by 
the  Legislature,  and  was  located  in  Delaware,  near  the  center 
of  the  State.  At  the  first  meeting  for  business  of  the  board 
of  trustees  Dr.  Thomson  was  elected  president  of  the  in- 
stitution. But  as  nothing  was  contemplated  for  the  present, 
except  a  preparatory  school,  the  services  of  the  doctor  were 
not  immediately  required  ;  hence  he  continued  as  principal 
at  Norwalk  for  a  longer  time.  The  finances  of  the  seminary 
were  at  this  time  in  a  bad  condition.  The  debts  on  the  old 
building,  together  with  those  of  the  new,  became  so  oppress- 
ive that  the  minds  of  the  trustees  were  filled  with  appre- 
hension. For  the  purpose  of  aiding  them  to  meet  those 
pressing  demands  a  society  was  organized  in  the  autumn 
of  1842,  known  as  the  "  Norwalk  Education  Societj^,"  the 
object  of  which  was  to  raise  funds  for  the  liquidation  of  the 
debt  of  the  seminary.  Rev.  Adam  Poe  was  elected  presi- 
dent, and  otlier  ofiicers  and  agents  were  appointed.  But  the 
funds  came  in  tardily  and  in  small  amounts,  and  the  debts 


NoRWALK  Seminary.  223 

still  remained,  growing  more  and  more  burdensome.  In  the 
fall  of  IS-iS  the  North  Ohio  Conference  elected  its  first  del- 
egates to  the  General  Conference,  and  Dr.  Thomson,  the 
youngest  member  of  the  delegation,  was  the  first  chosen. 
The  other  delegates  were  elected  in  this  order:  John  IJ. 
Power,  Adam  Poe,  Elmore  Yocum,  and  William  Kiinnells  ; 
reserve  delegates,  H.  M.  Shafer  and  L.  B.  Gurley. 

The  attachment  of  Dr.  Thomson  to  Ohio  and  to  his  Con- 
ference was  very  decided.  It  is,  perhaps,  not  generally 
known  that  two  very  tempting  offers  were  made  him  while 
at  Norwalk,  either  of  which,  if  accepted,  would  have  de- 
prived the  Ohio  Conference  of  his  invaluable  services. 
Transylvania  University  and  the  State  University  of  Michi- 
gan both  invited  him,  to  fill  the  presidency  of  the  former, 
and  the  chancellor's  position  in  the  latter.  His  salary  at 
Norwalk,  at  that  time,  was  but  $600,  while  either  of  the 
])laces  inviting  him  would  have  given  two  or  three  times 
that  sum  at  least. 

D.  L.  B.  Gurley  says :  "  I  was  his  near  neighbor  at  Nor- 
walk and  his  presiding  elder.  He  showed  me  the  invitation 
from  the  first  named,  and  asked  my  advice.  I  referred  to 
the  condition  of  the  South.  The  slave  question  was  then 
being  agitated.  I  dreaded  the  influence  of  a  residence  in  a 
slave  State,  and  urged  him  to  give  a  prompt  refusal,  which 
he  did.  The  proposal  from  Michigan  came  not  long  after. 
He  was  very  much  inclined  to  accept ;  but  the  General  Con- 
ference was  to  meet  in  the  following  May,  and  I  advised 
him  to  wait  until  it  was  over,  and  to  say  that,  unless  the 
(leneral  Conference  disposed  of  his  services  otherwise,  he 
v/oukl  accept." 

At  the  General  Conference  of  1S44  L.  L.  Hamlin e,  editor 
of  the  "  Ladies'  Hcpository,"  was  elected  one  of  the  Bishops 


224  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

of  the  Cliiircli,  and  tlie  friends  of  Dr.  Thomson  in  the  del- 
egation from  the  North  Ohio  Conference  immediately  put 
him  in  nomination  for  the  chair  which  was  thus  vacated. 
The  doctor  was  already  known  as  a  good  writer.  He  liad 
contributed  articles  for  the  Church  periodicals,  and  one  or  two 
of  his  addresses  had  been  printed  and  circulated  in  pamphlet 
form.  In  the  East  he  was  then  but  little  known  ;  but  as  lie 
was  named  for  the  position  of  the  editorship  by  the  Oliio 
delegates,  and  Ohio  wais  then,  as  now,  strong  in  strong  men. 
Dr.  Thomson  was  elected.  At  the  close  of  the  academic 
year  he  tendered  his  resignation  of  the  principalship  with 
great  regret  on  the  part  of  all. 

A  gentleman  of  Norwalk,  well  versed  in  all  matters  per- 
taining to  educational  interests,  and  especially  to  Norwalk 
Seminary,  speaking  of  Dr.  Thomson,  says  :  "  He  was  a  man 
of  fine  literary  attainments,  of  ripe  scholarship,  of  pleasing 
address,  of  refined  and  gentlemanly  manners,  and  of  purity 
of  life  and  character."  Referring  to  this  opinion,  Dr.  A. 
Nelson  says  :  "  He  also  might  have  added,  for  management 
of  scholars  and  power  over  youtli,  exercised  with  prudence 
and  skill,  he  was  rarely  ever  equaled,  and  never  excelled." 

The  Eev.  John  Burgess,  M.D.,  of  Keokuk,  Iowa,  furnishes 
a  description  of  the  doctor  at  Norwalk  :  "  In  1839  I  entered 
the  Norwalk  Seminary,  in  Huron  County,  Ohio,  under  the 
presidency  of  Dr.  Edward  Thomson.  Never  can  I  foi'get 
the  noble  reception  and  kindly  welcome  I  received  when  I 
handed  him  a  letter  from  my  father  committing  me  to  his 
special  care.  No  parent  could  have  shown  more  interest  for 
my  physical,  intellectual,  and  spiritual  advancement  than  did 
he  during  all  the  time  of  my  attendance  at  school.  The 
doctor,  in  addition  to  all  my  regnlar  class  advantages,  took 
me  under  his  private  instructions,  and  at  extra  hours  heard 


NoKWALK  Skminary.  225 

mc  recite  to  him  ;  so  that  at  a  much  earlier  date  he  advanced 
me  to  higher  classes  than  I  otherwise  would  have  reached. 
Never  did  I  know  any  person  more  attentive  to  the  welfare 
and  progress  of  all  his  students." 

"  In  the  seminary  Dr.  Thomson  was  assisted  by  three  of  the 
choice  men  of  earth,  as  faithful,  competent  teachei*s,  Alexan- 
der Nelson,  II olden  Dwight,  and  Horatio  S.  Bradley.  He 
left  imperishable  impressions  for  good  upon  hundreds  of 
youthful  minds  and  hearts,  which  are  now,  and  will  be  for 
all  time,  developing  for  human  happiness,  lie  touched  chords 
in  our  heai-ts  which  are  still  vibrating,  and  will  continue 
through  endless  ages.  Eternity  only  will  circumscribe  the 
gracious  influences  then  set  in  motion  by  that  holy  man  of 
God.     O  what  gems  will  sparkle  in  his  crown  of  rejoicing ! " 

Rev.  Ilolden  Dwight,  A.M.,  a  man  of  education  and  schol- 
arly ability,  succeeded  Dr.  Thomson  as  principal  of  the  Nor- 
walk  Seminary ;  but  the  claims  of  the  creditors  became  so 
pressing,  and  their  demands  so  urgent,  that  nothing  would 
satisfy  them  but  money  or  the  institution  itself.  Hence  the 
building  was  sold  for  the  benefit  of  the  creditors,  and  Nor- 
walk  Seminary  ceased  to  exist.  Very  few,  if  any,  of  the 
institutions  of  this  grade  and  length  of  duration  ever  turned 
out  more  eminent  young  men  or  more  discreet  and  well-edu- 
cated young  ladies  than  did  this  institution.  Every  depart- 
ment of  society  in  Ohio,  as  well  as  in  other  States^  has  been 
beneiited  by  those  w^ho  received  their  training  in  Norwalk 
Seminary.  Some  became  statesmen,  and  entered  Congress 
and  the  State  legislative  halls.  Hon.  Charles  Foster,  late 
Governor  of  Ohio,  and  Bishop  W.  L.  Harris,  D.D.,  LL.D., 
with  hundreds  of  others,  received  their  academic  educiition 

at  N(M'walk  Seminary. 
10* 


226  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTEK  XI. 

McKENDREE    COLLEGE. 

Section   1. 

BY  A.  W.  CUMMINGS,  D.D.,  LL.D. 


A  Methodist  Seminary  was  opened  bj  Edward  E.  Ames, 
— Bishop  Ames  of  later  years — in  Lebanon,  St.  Clair  County, 
111.,  in  1828.  A  substantial  frame  building,  two  stories  high, 
with  an  attic  and  wings,  was  erected  for  its  use  on  a  large, 
well-shaded  lot  of  rolling  land.  In  the  center  of  the  build- 
ing was  a  spacious  chapel.  This,  for  twentj-iive  years,  was 
the  only  place  in  the  village  for  public  religious  services.  In 
the  rear  was  a  large  dining-room.  The  wings,  with  the  second 
story  of  the  main  building  and  the  attic,  provided  recitation 
rooms,  a  library  room,  and  several  rooms  for  students.  In 
this  chapel  room  several  of  the  early  Bishops  and  fathers  of 
Illinois  Methodism  did  some  of  their  best  work.  From  it 
arose  to  Heaven  as  "  effectual,  fervent  prayer  "  as  ever  "  en- 
tered the  ears  of  the  Lord  of  Sabaoth." 

Many  a  man  now  distinguished  in  some  one  of  the  pro- 
fessions or  other  walks  of  usefulness  here  found  the  Saviour. 
In  1830  the  name  of  the  institution  became  M'Kcndree  Col- 
lege, Bishop  M'Kendree  having  made  to  it  its  then  largest 
gift,  four  hundred  and  eighty  acres  of  unimproved  land.  A 
(iharter,  after  several  denials,  was  obtained  from  the  State. 

Tlie  granting  of  this  charter  constituted  an  era  in  Illinois. 
So  controlling  was  the  opposition  to  colleges,  both  in  and  out 
of  the  Legislature,  that  charters  had  been  refused,  though 
often  sought.     In  1834  the  Baptists,  Congregationalists,  and 


M'Kendree  College.  227 

Methodists  desired  each  a  college  charter.  By  uniting  their 
influence  in  and  out  of  tlie  General  Assembly  a  bill  was  passed 
chartering  three  colleges :  M '  Kendree,  for  the  Methodist 
Church  ;  Shurtliff,  for  the  Baptist  Church ;  and  Illinois,  for 
the  Congregational  Church. 

To  secure  the  requisite  aid  to  found  colleges  in  communi- 
ties or  in  a  State  so  hostile  to  them  was  no  small  endeavor. 
Nor;e  but  moral  heroes  would  have  undertaken  it. 

Fortunately  leading  men  of  the  Illinois  Conference  from 
the  first  warmly  espoused  the  cause  of  the  college.  The 
Bishops,  on  their  annual  visitations,  always  had  an  encourag- 
ing word  for  the  infant  institution.  The  Church  at  large 
was  committed  to  the  cause  of  denominational  schools.  Each 
General  Conference  from  1784  had  urged  to  action  in  this 
field.  That  of  1820  advised  the  establishment  of  at  least  one 
school  of  high  grade  within  each  Annual  Conference. 

Until  183G  the  institution  had  been  conducted '  by  a  single 
teacher.  Then  Annis  Merrill  and  James  W.  Sunderland  be- 
came professors,  and,  two  years  later.  Rev.  John  TV.  Merrill 
became  president.  These  were  men  in  the  vigor  of  early 
manhood,  all  graduates  from  the  Wesleyan  University,  with 
a  diploma  signed  by  the  hand  of  Wilbur  Fisk,  S.T.D.  A  lib- 
eral curriculum  was  arranged,  and,  in  1841,  a  class  of  seven 
talented  young  men  were  admitted  to  the  Baccalaureate.  The 
event  was  memorable,  tlie  future  was  very  bright.  Clouds, 
however,  were  gathering  over  the  State,  and  soon  darkened 
the  college  sky.  A  monster  system  of  internal  improvement- 
had  been  devised  by  the  Legislature.  One  thousand  three 
hundred  and  forty-one  miles  of  railroads  had  been  surveyed. 
Millions  of  dollars  were  borrowed  and  expended ;  the  State 
became  involved  to  the  amount  of  $15,000,000,  and  had  not 
one  mile  of  completed  railroad  or  canal,  or  any  other  valuable, 


228  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

to  sliow  for  it.  In  1841  the  wliolc  scheme  collapsed.  The 
State  was  bankrupt.  Carried  away  by  the  prevailing  hallu- 
cination, the  trustees  of  the  college  attempted  a  grand  endow- 
ment scheme  by  the  sale  of  cheap  scholarships  on  credit,  and 
by  an  extensive  land  agency.  All  the  schemes  failed.  The 
college  was  without  means  to  pay  its  teachers,  and,  in  1844, 
closed  its  doors. 

Immigration  to  the  State  ceased  in  consequence  of  its 
heavy  indebtedness.  Land  nearly  ceased  to  have  a  market 
value.  The  people  who  owned  land  could  raise  large  crops, 
but,  with  no  demand  at  home,  or  means  to  reach  an  outside 
market,  their  products  were  almost  valueless. 

When  the  college  ceased  operation,  it  seemed  that  the  sus- 
pension would  be  perpetual.  It  would,  probably,  have  been 
so,  but  for  the  faith  and  efforts  of  one  man.  In  the  winter  of 
1846  Rev.  Davis  Goheen,  an  invalid  local  preacher,  late  of 
Pennsylvania,  but  then  settled  at  Lebanon,  published,  through 
" The  Christian  Advocate"  at  New  York,  an  appeal  to  min- 
isters then  in  the  pastoral  work,  but  who  had  had  some  ex- 
perience as  teachers,  detailing  the  causes  that  led  to  the  sus- 
pension of  M'Kendree  College,  and  giving  a  plan  by  which  it 
could  be  re-opened  and  saved  to  the  Church.  He  asked  for 
volunteers  to  serve  for  five  years  as  professors  on  the  smallest 
allowance  fixed  by  the  Discipline  for  pastoral  support.  To 
this  appeal  about  twenty-five  favorable  responses  were  made. 
From  these  volunteers,  after  a  careful  inquiry  as  to  the  fitness 
of  the  men  for  the  work,  Erastus  Wentworth,  A.M.,  Spencer 
Mattison,  A.M.,  both  of  Troy  Conference ;  A.  W.  Cummings 
A.M.,  of  the  Black  River  Conference;  and  William  Good- 
fellow,  a  probationer  in  the  Ohio  Conference,  were  chosen  as 
a  faculty.  The  salaries  fixed  by  the  trustees,  acting  as  the 
board  of  stewards,  was,  for  the  president,  $400  ;  each  of  the 


M'Kendree  College.  229 

two  professors,  $350 ;  and,  to  Mr.  Goodfcllow,  principal  of 
the  preparatory  school,  a  bachelor,  $100,  and  board  at  a  cost 
of  about  $75  per  annum.  To  raise  this  allowance  the  prin- 
cipal reliance  was  upon  what  was  known  as  "  The  Confer- 
ence Financial  Plan  for  the  support  of  M'Kendree  College." 
The  plan  was  for  each  class-leader  in  the  Conference  to  col- 
lect an  aggregate  of  twenty-Jwe  cents  quarterly  from  his  class, 
and,  through  the  presiding  elders,  forward  it  to  the  college 
treasurer.  So  populous  was  Methodism  in  the  State,  even  at 
that  early  date,  that  twenty-five  cents  quarterly  from  each 
class-leader,  with  the  small  sum  received  for  tuition,  would 
have  met  the  claims  of  the  faculty  at  M'Kendree.  The 
preachers  and  presiding  elders  earnestly  took  hold  of  this 
plan ;  but  so  poor  were  the  people,  and  so  scarce  was  money, 
that  it  required  much  talking  and  begging  to  secure  the 
quarters.  The  following  characteristic  letter,  copied  verba- 
tim from  an  old  scrap-book,  into  which  it  was  pasted  nearly 
forty  years  ago,  illustrates  this : 

"^Mwe  24/A,  1847.  Sangamon  rouNTT,  III. 

•'Dear  Brother  Wentworth  :  After  toiling  hard,  begginnf  and 
complaining  long  and  loud  to  the  scattered  remnants  of  the  Blooming- 
ton  District,  I  have  collected  five  dollars  more  for  the  support  of  the 
professors  in  'old  M'Kendree,'  and  I  inclose  it  in  this  scrawl,  but  I 
confess  I  am  heartily  ashamed  of  the  little  pitiful  sum,  and  I  am  de- 
termined to  keep  the  subject  before  the  Church,  and  will  'torment 
lliem  before  the  time.'    Yours  in  love  and  esteem,     Affectionatcl}^ 

"Peter  Cartwrioht." 
"Pleasam  Plains." 

The  sum,  of  coui*se,  was  less  than  "  the  plan  "  called  for. 
To  aid  it,  and  also  in  securing  students,  Mr.  Goheen,  through 
his  friend  the  late  Dr.  Lore,  then  in  pastoral  work  in  the 
Philadelphia  Conference,  begged    money  and    purchased  a 


230  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

second  hand  printing-press,  upon  which  was  printed  the  "  Illi- 
nois Advocate  and  Lebanon  Journal,"  edited  by  the  faculty, 
and  the  printing  was  done  by  students.  Only  those  connect- 
ed with  the  enterprise  can  estimate  how  greatly  these  small 
collections  aided  the  college  :  not  only  in  paying  the  teachers, 
but  in  educating  the  people  to  love  and  support  that  college. 

At. each  Quarterly  Conference  the  presiding  elder,  in  a 
speech  upon  the  interests  of  Methodist  education,  called  upon 
the  class-leaders  for  the  quarter,  and  the  class-leaders  upon 
their  classes.  These  opportunities  w^ere  improved  to  allay 
prejudice  and  awaken  interest.  An  increase  of  money  and  stu- 
dents was  the  result.  The  college  re-opened  in  October,  1846. 
During  the  year  thirty-eight  students  were  enrolled,  all  but 
one  in  the  preparatory  department.  The  tuition  for  the  year 
amounted  to  about  $500.  The  Conference  financial  plan  did 
the  rest.  Before  the  financial  plan  had  time  to  yield  results, 
Rev.  George  W.  E-obbins,  the  venerable  presiding  elder  of 
the  Lebanon  District,  went  with  a  farm  wagon  through  some 
of  the  neighborhoods  of  his  district  gathering  in  supplies  for 
the  professors'  tables. 

By  such  efforts  and  labors  was  M'Kendree  College  saved 
to  the  Church.  At  the  date  of  re-opening,  the  college  was 
indebted  $5,800.  For  a  portion  of  this,  executions  had  been 
issued,  and  the  property,  buildings  and  campus,  sold,  and  the 
day  of  redemption  would  soon  pass.  How  this  debt  could 
be  paid  and  the  property  saved  only  one  man  in  the  com- 
munity or  State  saw.  To  the  faith  of  Davis  Goheen  the 
way  was  easy.  One  hundred  and  sixty  acres  of  the  M'Ken- 
dree land  remained  unsold.  This,  in  fee  simple,  was  deeded 
to  Professor  Cummings;  thus  secured,  he  and' that  noble  old 
Methodist  friend,  the  late  Nathan  Horner,  borrowed,  upon 
their  individual  note,  money  to  redeem  the  property.     The 


M'Kendkee  College.  231 

land  was  divided  into  tracts  of  ten  or  more  acres,  and  before 
tlie  note  was  due,  was  sold  to  German  immigrants,  tlien  fast 
filling  up  that  part  of  the  county  in  which  Bishop  M'Ken- 
dree  located  his  section  of  land.  The  property  was  saved, 
and  money  left  for  other  purposes.  A  second  note  was 
made,  and  $950  more  borrowed.  With  this  the  greatly  de- 
preciated paper  of  the  broken  Shawneetown  Bank  was  pur- 
chased, and  the  large  debt  to  that  institution  was  paid.  At 
the  end  of  three  years  the  college  was  free  from  debt,  and 
was  so  prosperous  that  a  new  college  building  was  contem- 
plated. To-day,  to  extinguish  a  debt  against  a  Methodist 
college  of  $5,800,  would  be  too  insignificant  a  matter  to  be 
worthy  of  mention ;  to  the  friends  of  M'lvendree  College, 
forty  years  ago,  it  was  a  formidable  undertaking.  Its  accom- 
plisliment  was  an  occasion  of  thanks  to  God,  and  to  all  who 
had  aided  its  accomplishment.  On  January  20, 18^9,  a  meet- 
ing of  the  citizens  in  the  college  chapel  passed  this  resolution : 

""  liesolved^  That,  in  view  of  the  necessities  of  M'Kendree 
College,  we  deem  it  essential  that  immediate  steps  be  taken 
to  secure  the  erection  of  a  college  edifice,  at  a  cost  of  about 
$10,000,  and  that  we  pledge  the  citizens  of  Lebanon  for  one 
filtli  of  that  sum,  and  that  we  will  contribute  thereto  in  pro- 
portion to  our  several  abilities." 

After  discussion  this  was  unanimously  carried.  $2,000 
seemed  a  large  sum  for  a  village  of  a  few  hundred  inhabit- 
ants, who  had  never  been  able  to  provide  a  church  edifice  for 
themselves,  or  a  school-house  for  their  children.  To  raise  the 
$2,000  it  was  felt  that  one  man,  of  more  means  than  any 
otlier  in  the  church,  must  pay  $500,  and  othere  in  proportion. 
It  was  also  felt  that  of  such  an  advance  ui)on  what  he  had 
ever  done,  tlicre  was  not  much  ho]>e  unless  some  unusual 
iiifiuence  was  employed.     The  subscription  was  drawn,  and 


232  Early  Schools  of  Methodism.  • 

signed  first  by  two  of  the  poorly  paid  professors,  wlio  signed 
jointly,  tlms :  Wentwortli  and  Cummings,  $500.  Oar 
worthy  brother  James  Riggin  followed  with  $500.  Then 
came  a  trustee  with  $300,  and  another  with  $200.  Here 
was  three  fourths  of  the  required  sum.  More  than  the  lack- 
ing $500  was  pledged,  and  all  in  due  time  was  paid. 

The  newspapers  of  St.  Louis,  but  twenty  miles  distant,  and 
the  papers  of  Illinois  generally,  mentioned  the  liberal  action 
at  Lebanon,  and  prepared  the  way  for  Rev.  Mr.  Goodfellow's 
successful  mission  to  raise  the  balance  demanded. 

On  the  day  of  the  next  annual  commencement  the  corner- 
stone of  the  new  edifice  was  laid.  On  the  same  day,  suffer- 
ing in  health  from  excessive  labors.  Dr.  Wentwortli  resigned 
the  presidency.  The  trustees  on  the  same  day  filled  the  va- 
cancy by  the  unanimous  election  of  Prof.  Cummings.  This 
honorable  position  Dr.  Cummings  had  declined  five  years  be- 
fore, and  still  doubted  his  adaptation  to  the  work.  The  presi- 
dency then  required  full  work  in  the  lecture  room,  preach- 
ing every  Sabbath,  often  at  points  to  be  reached  on  horse- 
back, by  stage,  or  a  buggy,  as  also  the  editing  of  the  college 
paper,  the  "  Illinois  Christian  Advocate."  The  action  of  the 
students  requesting  his  acceptance,  and  two  months  later  the 
action  of  his  Annual  Conference,  expressed  by  a  unanimous 
rising  vote,  so  far  overcame  his  reluctance  that  at  the  open- 
ing of  the  term  he  entered  upon  the  duty.  In  this  new  rela- 
tion Dr.  Cummings  served  the  college  two  years.  In  1854, 
with  the  hope  of  regaining  his  health  in  that  fine  climate,  he 
accepted  the  presidency  of  a  large  flourishing  female  college 
in  East  Tennessee,  and  the  next  year  the  same  position  in 
the  Holston  Conference  Female  College,  at  Asheville,  North 
Carolina.  At  the  close  of  the  w^ar  he  removed  to  Soutli 
Carolina;  w^as  then  in  charge  for  a  time  of  the  Metliodist 


M'Kendree  College.  233 

Female  College  at  Spartanburg,  afterward  filled,  for  five 
years,  a  professorship  in  the  old  State  University ;  then  the 
presidency  of  the  same.  In  1877  he  was  transferred,  by 
Bishop  Harris,  to  the  Genesee  Conference,  in  which  he  is 
now  a  supernumerary,  with  his  home  at  Wellsville,  N.  Y. 

Daring  the  writer's  connection  with  the  college  the  fol- 
lowing work  was  accomplished  :  The  property  was  redeemed 
from  the  hands  of  the  sheriff ;  the  old  debts  were  paid ;  a 
new  edifice  was  erected  ;  the  income  paid  current  expenses ; 
the  perpetuity  of  the  institution  was  secured ;  a  large  num- 
ber of  young  men  were  started  upon  a  course  of  liberal  edu- 
cation; twenty  of  them  completed  the  scientific  course  of 
study,  and  fifteen  the  full  classical  course.  The  honorary 
M.A.  was  conferred  upon  the  Revs.  D.  D.  Lore,  James  Lea- 
ton,  J.  C.  Berryman,  W.  W.  Mitcliell,  and  upon  Dr.  D.  M. 
Cooper.  The  D.D.  upon  Revs.  William  Nast,  of  the  "  Chris- 
tian Apologist;"  John  Dempster,  founder  of  our  Biblical 
schools;  and  D.  P.  Kidder,  of  Garrett  Biblical  Institute. 
The  LL.D.  upon  Governor  A.  C.  French,  of  Illinois ;  Pro- 
fessor John  Johnston,  of  Wesleyan  University ;  and  Rev.  Pro- 
fessor W.  C.  Larrabee,  of  Indiana  Wesleyan  University.  No 
teachers  ever  achieved  success  under  greater  discouragements 
than  did  the  faculty  of  M'Kendree  College,  that  volunteered 
to  work  five  years  for  a  bare  living,  upon  the  most  econom- 
ical scale.  For  that  success  they  were  largely  dependent 
upon  the  cordial  co-operation  of  the  resident  board  of  tmst- 
ees,  those  grand  laymen :  Nathan  Horner,  and  his  son  Judge 
H.  n.  Homer,  Benjamin  Hypes,  Joseph  Hypes,  H.  K.  Ash- 
ley, Rev.  Davis  Goheen,  Rev.  David  Chamberlin,  and  Crispin 
Cunningham,  Esq. 

Several  of  the  alumni  of  these  years  became  widely  known 
and  very  useful  men.     Reuben  Andrus,  D.D.,  was  at  the 


234  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

liead  of  several  noted  schools,  among  tliem  tlic  Indiana  As- 
biiry  University.  Hiram  Sears,  A.M.,  "W.  M.  M'Elfresh, 
and  John  Leeper,  became  leading  men  and  presiding  elders 
in  their  Conferences.  Professor  C.  Wesley  Jerome  became 
a  noted  woj*ker  in  State  and  National  Sabbath-school  Associa- 
tions, and  he  has  long  been  the  senior  professor  in  the  State 
Normal  University.  Hon.  J.  J.  Rinaker  distinguished  him- 
self as  a  general  in  the  Union  army.  Hon.  S.  L.  Bryan  be- 
came eminent  at  the  bar,  upon  the  bench,  and  in  the  Senate. 
Hon.  W.  A.  J.  Sparks  was  for  several  terms  in  Congress, 
and  filled  several  other  positions  under  the  general  govern- 
ment. R.  M.  Moore,  Oliver  Jones,  W.  H.  Corrington,  H. 
C.  Fike,  W.  S.  Pope,  and  many  others,  were  influential 
teachers.  There  was  not  one  of  the  graduates  of  these  years 
who  did  not  make  a  good  record  in  life. 


Section   II. 
BY  PROFESSOR  SAMUEL  H.   DENEEN,  A.M.,   PH.D. 

Rev.  Peter  Akebs,  D.D.,  was  chosen  president  in  the 
autumn  of  1852,  and  held  the  office  five  years.  Daring  his 
incumbency  a  second  attempt  to  endow  the  college  by  the 
sale  of  scholarships  was  made,  and  signally  failed.  The  old 
college  building,  that  had  so  long  done  good  service,  was 
consumed  by  fire.  The  present  spacious  chapel  building 
was  provided,  in  response  to  the  call  for  help  by  Dr.  Akers. 
Rev.  Dr.  W.  R.  Davis,  senior  professor,  performed  the  duties 
of  president  during  the  first  of  the  year  1857-58,  and  in  the 
spring  the  office  was  filled  by  Rev.  N.  E.  Cobleigh,  D.D. 
Dr.  Cobleigh  made  at  once  an  appeal  to  the  Soutliern  Illinois 
Conference  and  the  citizens  of  Lebanon  and  vicinity  for  an 
endowment   of   at    least   $20,000.      This   good   work   was 


M'Kendree  College.  235 

coiTiplcted  in  1860.  It  relieved  the  college  from  immediate 
pressure,  and  assured  its  permanence.  Dr.  Cobleigli  re- 
tired in  1863,  and  the  well-known  Kobert  Allyn,  D.D., 
LL.D.,  accepted  the  presidency  and  held  it  eleven  years. 
Dr.  Allyn  made  progress  in  sinking  the  debt  upon  the  col- 
lege, and,  under  his  advice,  the  institution  was  opened  to 
ladies.  In  1874  Rev.  John  W.  Locke,  D.D.,  a  graduate  of 
old  Augusta  College,  succeeded  Dr.  Allyn.  He  had  been 
four  years  president  of  Brookville  College,  Indiana  ;  twelve 
years  professor  in  Indiana  Asbury  University,  and  for  a  short 
time  was  president  of  Baker  University,  Kansas.  During 
his  presidency  a  commercial  department  was  opened  ;  the 
endowment  was  increased  by  the  bequest  of  Mrs.  James 
Eiggin  of  $23,000,  and  of  Dr.  N.  M.  M'Curdy  of  $25,000. 

Dr.  Locke's  successor  was  Ross  C.  Houghton,  D.D.,  who, 
not  pleased  with  the  financial  outlook,  was  never  inaugurated, 
and,  at  the  end  of  one  year,  left  the  position  for  Daniel  W, 
Phillips,  D.D.,  the  first  alumnus  of  the  college  honored  with 
that  responsibility.  During  the  presidency  of  Dr.  Phillips 
the  old  debt  of  $7,000  was  paid.  He  retired  with  honor  in 
1883,  and  was  succeeded  by  the  present  incumbent.  Rev. 
William  F.  Swahlen,  A.M.,  Ph.D.  He  is  a  graduate  of  the 
University  of  Pennsylvania,  an  accomplished  scholar,  and  an 
experienced  educator. 

FINANCIAL   HISTORY. 

The  first  attempt  to  endow  the  college  has  been  mentioned 
in  the  lii*st  part  of  this  article.  At  that  time  "  the  national 
road  "  was  in  process  of  construction.  It  was  confidently 
expected  that  its  completion  would  greatly  enhance  the  value 
of  Illinois  lands  and  augment  its  population.  The  land 
agency  of  the  college  was  undertaken  at  that  time.     But  the 


236  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

bill  for  the  completion  of  that  great  work  was  vetoed  by 
President  Jackson.  Financial  disasters  followed,  and  con- 
tinued through  the  administration  of  President  Yan  Buren. 
It  was  during  this  fearful  crisis  in  all  business  interests  that 
the  college  was  suspended.  In  1854  a  committee,  consist- 
ing of  Dr.  James  Leaton,  Rev.  W.  L.  Deneen,  and  Judge 
W.  H.  Underwood,  reported  a  plan  to  raise  an  endowment 
of  $100,000  by  the  sale  of  perpetual  scholarships,  transfer- 
able only  to  the  college,  and  available  only  to  the  children  of 
the  purchasers.  These  safeguards  were,  most  unfortunately, 
afterward  removed  by  the  college  trustees,  and  the  usual  dis- 
aster followed.  A  large  number  of  the  scholarships  were 
sold,  mostly  on  unsecured  notes,  and  but  few  of  them  ever 
paid  for. 

The  late  Governor  French,  law  professor  in  the  college, 
found,  on  careful  examination,  that  for  each  dollar  received 
from  this  source  one  dollar  and  two  cents  had  been  paid  by 
the  college.  A  large  increase  of  students  was  the  only  ben- 
efit from  this  scheme. 

The  creation  of  a  permanent  endowment  is  due  to  Dr. 
Cobleigh.  By  his  exertions  about  $22,000  was  secured. 
From  the  centennial  offerings  of  the  Southern  Illinois  Con- 
ference $2,500  were  added.  Bequests  and  other  gifts  bring 
up  the  sum  to  $75,000.  But  about  half  of  this  is  yet  yield- 
ing interest.  The  tuition  and  interest  of  invested  funds  pay 
expenses.  The  entire  property  and  funds  of  the  college  now 
foot  up  $135,000. 

GROUNDS   AND   BUILDINGS. 

The  college  park  contains  seventeen  acres,  thoroughly 
shaded  by  forest  trees  of  natural  growth.  Its  charms  attract 
the  attention  of  all  visitoi*s.     It  is  never  seen  to  greater  ad- 


M'Kendree  College.  237 

• 

vantage  than  in  June,  during  commencement  week.  It  is  a 
Mecca  to  those  who,  in  their  early  years,  had  trodden  its 
walks  or  reclined  beneath  its  stately  trees.  The  buildings 
are  plain,  substantial  structures,  well  adapted  to  the  purposes 
for  which  they  were  erected.  The  foundation  of  the  prin- 
cipal building  was  laid  during  the  administration  of  Presi- 
dent Wentworth.  It  was  planned,  superintended  to  com- 
pletion, and  opened  for  use  by  President  Cummings.  It  is 
three  stories,  of  brick.  The  first  and  second  stories  are  each 
divided  into  four  large  rooms  for  recitations ;  the  third  is 
divided  into  two  noble  halls  for  the  gentlemen's  literary  so- 
cieties. The  chapel  building  is  two  stories  ;  the  audience 
room,  one  of  the  largest  in  the  State,  is  on  the  upper  floor. 
The  lower  story  gives  rooms  for  the  library,  the  cabinet,  and 
the  ladies'  literary  society.  The  Commercial  Hall  building  is 
but  one  story,  elegantly  finished  and  furnished. 

THE    LIBRARY, 

though  not  large,  is  valuable.  Standard  books  of  reference 
were  principally  purchased.  Most  of  the  books  have  been 
received  as  donations.  The  largest  gift  of  books  was  by  the 
late  Kev.  Dr.  Robert  Emory. 

LITERARY    SOCIETIES. 

The  Philosophian  was  founded  in  1837,  the  Platonian  in 

1840,  the  Cleonian  in  1869.     These  societies  have  elegant 

halls  and  are  well  managed  ;  they  are  the  pride  of  the 
college. 

THE   CABINET 

has  been  gathered  from  many  parts  of  the  globe.  South 
America  and  the  Old  World  have  made  their  contributions. 
It  is  increaj>ing  in  value  every  year. 


238  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

ALUMNI. 

This  roll  contains  about  four  hundred  names.  Each  year 
since  1841,  except  the  years  1846  and  1855,  has  added  to  it. 
The  candidates  for  enrollment  in  this  list  came  from  the 
most  energetic  and  best  families  of  Illinois  and  contiguous 
States.  They  are  now  found  in  all  the  professions,  and  are 
filling  many  of  the  places  of  honor  among  men.  When 
dangers  threatened  the  country  they  were  ready  to  receive  or 
repel  the  blow.  They  filled  all  stations  in  the  army  to  pre- 
serve the  Union,  from  the  private  to  the  major-general.  The 
recital  of  their  deeds  of  daring  forms  an  interesting  chapter 
in  the  history  of  the  college. 

LIST   OF   PKESIDENTS. 

Revs.  John  Dew,  J.  W.  Merrill,  D.D.,  J.  C.  Finley,  M.D., 
Erastus  Wentworth,  D.D.,  Anson  W.  Cummings,  LL.D., 
Peter  Akers,  D.D.,  N.  E.  Cobleigh,  D.D.,  Eobert  Allyn, 
LL.D.,  John  W.  Lock,  D.D.,  E.  C.  Houghton,  D.D.,  D.  W. 
Phillips,  D.D.,  and  W.  F.  Swahlen,  Ph.D. 

LIST   OF   PROFESSORS. 

Annis  Merrill,  M.A.,  H.  H.  Horner,  M.A.,  Eev.  G.  L. 
Eoberts,  M.A.,  Eev.  Spencer  Mattison,  M.A.,  Oran  Faville, 
LL.D.,  Eev.  G.  G.  Jones,  M.A.,  S.  W.  Williams,  M.A.,  A. 
A.  Scott,  M.A.,  S.  H.  Deneen,  Ph.D.,  James  W.  Sunderland, 
LL.D.,  J.  L.  Scripps,  M.A.,  Eev.  E.  Z.  Mason,  LL.D.,  Eev. 
E.  C.  Merrick,  M.  A.,  E.  M.  Moore,  M.A.,  O.  Y.  Jones,  M.A., 
Eev.  Joseph  Harris,  M.A.,  James  Leaton,  D.D.,  W.  E. 
Davis,  D.D.,  F.  O.  Blair,  M.A.,  Eev.  E.  E.  Edwards,  Ph.D., 
Lucy  J.  Eider,  M.A.,  E.  B.  Waggoner,  M.A.,  Hon.  A.  C. 
French,  LL.D.,  Sarah  A.  Barnes,  M.A. 


Amenia  Seminar 


CHAPTER  XII. 

AMENIA      SEMINARY. 

BY  ALBERT  8.   HUNT,   D.  D. 

This  institutioir  is  located  at  Amenia,  Dutchess  County, 
N.  Y.  Amenia  is  historic  ground  for  Methodism.  George 
Whitefield  preached  liere  in  July,  1770,  only  a  few  weeks 
before  his  death.  Bishop  Asbury  visited  the  town  from  time 
to  time,  attracted  by  the  prominence  and  steriing  worth  of 
the  society,  which  was  the  outgrowth  of  a  class  organized  by 
Freeborn  Garrettson.  Here,  in  1808,  Asbury  presided  over 
the  New  York  Conference,  which -held  its  session  in  the  old 
"  Round-top  School-house,"  and,  in  1813,  he  and  M'Kendree 
were  present  at  the  meeting  of  the  same  body  in  the  new 
church,  erected  during  the  previous  year. 

The  seminary  was  opened  in  the  autumn  of  1835,  under 
tlie  direction  of  a  board  of  twenty-three  trustees.  The  school 
building,  three  stories  high  and  sixty  feet  in  length,  was  erected 
during  the  preceding  summer  on  a  rise  of  ground  formerly 
known  as  Cook's  Hill.  A  second  building  was  soon  erected, 
and  then  a  third.  The  Hon.  George  G.  Reynolds,  now  of 
Brooklyn,  but  a  native  of  Amenia,  was  for  a  time  a  teacher 
in  the  seminary,  while  yet  an  under-graduate  at  the  AVesleyau 
University.  In  a  letter  to  Rev.  Joseph  Cummings  he  says : 
"  I  remember  that  the  two  men  who  originated  and  consum- 
mated the  undertaking  were  George  Ingraham  and  Joseph  D. 
Hunt.  But  for  them  Amenia  Seminary,  as  we  knew  it,  would 
never  h.ave  existed."  Mr.  Ingraham  was  one  of  the  purest 
and  best  men  I  ever  knew.     He  was  discreet,  well  balanced. 


240  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

full  of  sympatliy  for  the  young,  and,  more  than  all,  a  ^lan 
whose  godliness  was  decided  and  winning.  For  fifteen  years 
as  trustee  and  as  president  of  the  board  of  trustees  his  best 
efforts  were  devoted  to  the  welfare  of  the  institution. 

Judge  Reynolds  has  associated  my  father  with  Mr.  In- 
graham,  and  historic  truth  would  be  measurably  violated  if  I 
failed  to  respect  his  statement,  but  it  would  not  become  me 
to  enlarge  upon  it.  The  two,  perhaps,  never  met,  except  in 
church,  without  exchanging  views  upon  the  interests  of 
Amenia  Seminary.  Mr.  Ingraham  died  in  1849,  and  Mr. 
Hunt  in  1864. 

The  first  steward  of  the  seminary  was  David  Clark.  After 
five  years  he  accepted  a  similar  position  in  the  Genesee  Wes- 
leyan  Seminary,  at  Lima,  N.  Y.  In  1840  Mr.  Clark  was  suc- 
ceeded by  Hiram  Yail,  one  of  the  original  ti-ustees.  In  this 
position  his  rare  executive  abilities  had  a  large  field  and  con- 
stant exercise.  If  orderly  and  respectful,  students  found  no 
better  friend  than  "  Uncle  Hiram  ; "  but  the  mischievous  and 
idle  were  very  likely  to  learn  his  honest  estimate  of  them. 

The  first  principal  of  the  seminary  was  the  Rev.  Charles 
K.  True,  A.M.,  and  his  associates  in  the  faculty  were  Fred- 
erick Merrick,  Joseph  True,  Daniel  P.  Kidder,  Amos  Prin- 
dle,  and  Miss  Lavinia  Barker.  Mr.  True  was  a  graduate  of 
Harvard  College,  where  he  distinguished  himself  as  a  public 
speaker,  taking  a  prize  for  his  impressive  delivery  of  Paul's 
address  before  Agrippa.  He  was  converted  at  Eastham 
camp-meeting,  on  the  day  that  he  was  twenty-one  j^ears  of 
age.  From  that  time  he  was  an  earnest  Christian.  He  re- 
mained at  Amenia  but  a  single  session,  leaving  in  the  spring 
of  1836.  It  is  a  pleasure  to  be  able,  in  this  connection,  to  pre- 
sent a  few  paragraphs  from  the  pen  of  Mrs.  Dr.  D.  P.  Kidder, 
who  was  a  scholar  at  Amenia  while  Dr.  True  was  in  charge : 


Amenia  Seminary.  241 

"  I  was  enrolled,"  she  sajs,  "  as  a  pnpil  in  Amenia  Seminary 
the  first  day  of  its  opening.  Living  within  the  bounds  of 
the  New  York  Conference,  I  liad  caught  some  of  the  enthu- 
siasm spread  througli  the  country  by  the  preachers  concern- 
ing a  new  Methodist  school  in  our  midst,  and  so,  guided  by 
tlie  public  announcement  of  the  time  of  opening,  took  the 
journey  of  forty  miles  across  the  Connecticut  hills  to  be 
present  on  the  day  specified.  Arriving  in  the  village  the 
evening  previous,  the  brightness  of  anticipation  was  consider- 
ably dimmed  by  finding,  instead  of  a  school  ready  to  receive 
its  pupils,  an  unfinished  building,  with  no  room  in  readiness 
for  use.  though  one  of  the  school-rooms  was  in  such  a  condi- 
tion that  we  could  assemble  in  it  for  enrollment  and  organi- 
zation. Instead  of  private  students'  rooms,  the  unfinished 
chapel  was  temporarily  used  for  a  girls'  dormitory,  and  our 
beds  were  spread  upon  its  floor,  these  beds  serving,  also,  as 
seats  in  our  study  liours.  I  think  eighty  students  were  en- 
rolled the  first  day,  and,  notwithstanding  the  disorder  and 
inconvenience  of  all  our  surroundings,  the  school  work  sys- 
tematically began. 

"  Mr.  True,  the  principal,  and  Mr.  Merrick,  his  associate, 
were  e([u:il  to  the  emergency,  and,  by  the  kindliness  of  their 
manner,  and  the  interest  they  awakened  in  us  for  study,  we 
soon  became  an  orderly  company,  prosecuting  our  work  as  if 
the  circumstances  were  favorable  to  student  life.  It  is  due 
to  the  memory  of  Mr.  True  to  say,  that  from  no  other  teacher 
did  I  ever  receive  such  an  inspiration  for  study  and  develop- 
ment, and  his  Christian  influence  over  me  was  ecpially  im- 
pressive and  favorable.  I  remember  well  the  first  prayer- 
meeting  held  in  the  parlor  of  the  seminary  as  soon  as  tlie 
room  was  ready  for  use.  The  principal  manifested  no  less 
interest  in  the  spiritual  than   in  the   mental  development  of 


242  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

tlie  young  persons  under  his  charge,  and  his  loving  way  of 
presenting  those  higher  claims  upon  them  was  fruitful  in 
good  results.  Those  parlor  prayer-meetings  were  occasions 
never  to  be  forgotten  by  many  in  attendance ;  and  seeds  were 
sown  in  them,  that  opening  term  of  the  seminary,  which  have 
borne  fruit  the  intervening  half-century." 

After  Mr.  True  left  Amenia  he  was  engaged  for  the  most 
part  in  pastoral  work  until  1849,  when  he  became  professor 
of  moral  science  and  heUes-lettres  in  the  "Wesleyan  Univer- 
sity. Here  he  remained  for  about  ten  years,  when  lie 
returned  to  pastoral  service.  Dr.  True  died  in  1878,  while 
in  charge  of  a  church  in  Brooklyn,  N.  Y. 

The  Eev.  Frederick  Merrick  succeeded  Mr.  True  as  prin- 
cipal, in  the  spring  of  1836.  The  Rev.  D.  P.  Kidder,  A.B., 
was  the  teacher  in  ancient  and  modern  languages,  who, 
when  he  resigned  to  enter  the  itinerancy,  was  succeeded  by 
William  W.  Marsh,  A.B.  Davis  W.  Clark,  A.B.,  had 
charge  of  the  department  of  mathematics;  Lorenzo  W. 
Blood,  and  later  William  S.  AViley,  taught  the  English 
bi'anches.  Miss  Almena  M.  Pelton,  who  taught  the  orna- 
mental branches,  was  the  preceptress  for  a  brief  jjcriod,  when 
the  position  was  filled  by  Miss  Lavinia  Barker.  Miss  Mar- 
cella  E.  Russell  and  Mr.  Amos  Prindle  acted  as  assistant 
teachers  for  a  portion  of  the  time,  and  upon  the  resignation 
of  Miss  Pelton,  Miss  Marianne  Clark,  daughter  of  Rev.  La- 
ban  Clark,  became  the  teacher  of  music  and  painting. 

Mr.  Merrick  was  two  years  in  office,  and  proved  himself 
admirably  fitted  for  his  position.  The  trustees,  his  associ- 
ates in  the  faculty,  and  the  students  were  deeply  imj^ressed 
by  his  kindly  and  scholarly  ways.  He  left  Amenia  for 
Ohio,  where,  in  connection,  first  with  the  State  University  at 
Athens,  and   th^n  with   the   Ohio  Wesleyan  University,  at 


Amenia  Seminary.  213 

Delaware,  he  has  rendered  honorable  service  for  nearly  half 
a  century.  Dr.  Merrick  writes  as  follows,  concerning  the 
seminary  at  this  period : 

The  trustees  were  men  of  marked  intelligence  and  enterprise,  and  of 
sterling  worth.  My  associates  in  the  faculty  were  industrious,  cultured, 
and  efficient.  After  fifty  years'  experience  in  teaching  I  must  place  my 
Amenia  students  among  the  best  it  has  been  my  privilege  to  instruct. 
Some  of  them  have  become  quite  eminent.  The  most  notable  event 
during  my  connection  with  the  institution  was  the  religious  revival, 
during  the  winter  of  183G-37.  Its  history  is  wortiiy  of  being  written  in 
detail,  but  I  have  no  time  to  do  it.  It  was  eminently  the  work  of  the 
Spirit.  It  began  without  any  special  services,  and  moved  on  with  but 
little  of  human  instrumentality.  The  work  was  deep  and  thorough, 
and  most  of  the  students  not  before  converted  were  converted  during 
its  progress.  Many  of  the  young  men  became  ministers  of  the  Gospel, 
and  a  singular  number  of  the  young  women  became  ministers'  wives. 
It  was  a  timely  lesson  and  experience  to  myself,  as  well  as  to  some  of 
my  colleagues. 

It  should  be  stated  as  a  somewhat  important  fact  in  the 
history  of  the  seminary,  that  during  the  principalship  of  Mr. 
Merrick  it  was  chartered  by  the  regents  of  the  University  of 
the  State  of  New  York. 

The  immediate  successor  of  Mr.  Merrick  was  the  Rev.  Davis 
W.  Clark,  A.B.  He  was  a  native  of  the  Island  of  Mount 
Desert,  Me.,  and  a  graduate  of  Wesleyan  University.  He 
had  been  for  two  years  a  member  of  the  board  of  instruc- 
tion as  teacher  of  mathematics,  in  which  department  he 
achieved  decided  success.  He  began  at  this  time  the  prepa- 
ration of  a  work  on  algebra,  which  was  given  to  thfe  press 
a  few  years  later.  The  Rev.  Edward  Cooke,  A.B.,  was 
the  teacher  of  natural  science  from  1838  to  1840.  Rev. 
Stephen  M.  Yail,  A.B.,  taught  the  ancient  languages  in  1838, 
ll<jv.  Edward  E.  E  Bragdon  in  1839,  and  Rev.  Joseph  Den- 


244  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

ison,  A.B.,  for  the  remaining  years  of  Mr.  Clark's  admin- 
istration. Wlien  Mr.  Cooke  resigned,  Eev.  Joseph  Cum- 
mings,  A.B.,  succeeded  him.  Other  teachers,  during  por- 
tions of  this  period,  were  Mr.  Daniel  Shaw,  Collingwood 
Rutherford,  Oliver  E.  Brown,  John  H.  Twomblj,  William 
S.  Coggeshall,  and  Geo.  G.  Eejnolds.  Miss  Lavinia  Barker 
continued  to  act  as  preceptress  until  nearly  the  close  of  Mr. 
Clark's  period  of  service,  when  Miss  Samantha  Brightnian 
succeeded  her.  Miss  Catharine  F.  Park  and  Mrs.  Caroline 
G.  Eandall  successively  acted  as  teachers  of  music  and  draw- 
ing. The  seminary  was  prosperous  in  every  respect  during 
this  administration.  Its  numbers  increased,  its  high  standard 
of  scholarship  was  well  maintained,  and  several  revivals  of 
religion  occurred.  Among  the  converts  received  into  the 
Church  on  one  Sabbath  in  1840  were  Elizabeth  A.  Yail  and 
Andrew  J.  Hunt,  who  in  after  years  became  respectively  the 
preceptress  and  the  principal  of  the  institution.  Mr.  Clark 
joined  the  New  York  Conference  in  1843,  and  his  successful 
career,  as  pastor,  editor,  and  Bishop,  is  a  matter  of  familiar 
Church  history. 

Mr.  Clark  was  succeded  in  office  by  the  Bev.  Joseph  Cum- 
mings,  also  a  native  of  Maine  and  a  graduate  of  the  Wcslcyan 
University.  He  had  been  for  three  years  very  successful  and 
popular  as  the  teacher  of  the  natural  sciences.  When  he  be- 
came principal  he  taught  moral  science  and  the  higher  classes 
in  mathematics.  In  every  department  he  disj)layed  the  rare 
gifts  which  in  after  years  gave  him  distinction  in  higher 
institrftions. 

When  Mr.  Cummings  became  principal,  the  Rev.  Erastus 
O.  Haven,  A.B.,  became  the  teacher  in  natural  science. 
Richard  Ingraham,  A.B.,  was  for  a  year  the  teacher  of  an- 
cient languages,  and  then  the  department  became  the  charge 


Amenia  Seminary.  245 

of  Thomas  P.  Underwood,  A.  B.,  all  graduates  of  the  Wes- 
leyan  University.  The  position  of  preceptress  continued  to 
be  tilled  by  Miss  Brightinan  until  1845,  when  Miss  Margaret 
Marshall  succeeded  her.  Mrs.  Randall  held  the  position  slie 
accepted  under  Mr.  Clark  for  most  of  the  time,  and  then 
Miss  Electa  W.  Coles  became  teacher  of  instrumental  music. 
Mr.  Coggeshall  remained  in  charge  of  the  department  of  En- 
glish literature.  During  Mr.  Cummings's  administration  the 
practice  was  adopted  of  giving  diplomas  to  those  who  com- 
pleted a  prescribed  course  of  study. 

Rev.  Erastus  Otis  Haven,  who  became  the  principal  of 
the  seminary  in  1846,  was  born  in  Boston,  Mass.,  and  w^as 
graduated  at  the  Wesleyan  University  in  1843.  While  he 
was  at  the  head  of  the  institution  Thomas  P.  Underwood, 
Alexander  Winchell,  Gilbert  Haven,  William  M.  Ingraham, 
Andrew  J.  Hunt,  Miles  Grant,  Horatio  N.  Powers,  and  Al- 
bert S.  Hunt  were  members  of  the  faculty  for  longer  or 
shorter  periods.  Miss  Anna  E.  Adams  and  Mrs.  Caroline  G. 
Randall  successively  filled  the  position  of  preceptress,  with 
Miss  Elizabeth  A.  Yail,  Miss  Julia  F.  Lines,  Miss  Elizabeth 
W.  Goodsell,  and  Miss  Helen  M.  Bird  as  associate  teachers. 

Mr.  Haven  did  not  come  to  his  position  as  a  stranger,  for 
he  had  been  two  years  a  member  of  the  fiiculty.  He  was  a 
man  of  remarkable  versatility,  and  seemed  able,  without  ap- 
parent effort,  to  do  any  thing  and  every  thing  well.  If  he 
was  seldom  brilliant  in  address,  he  was  always  lucid.  xYs  a 
preacher,  he  was  a  great  favorite  with  the  students  and  with 
the  entire  community.  He  governed  well,  but  made  no 
show  of  authority.  In  his  autobiography  we  have  his  views 
<  m  the  government  of  college  boys ;  and  those  who  know 
the  history  of  his  principalship  at  Amenia  know  very  well 
that  he  did,  in  one  or  two  marked  instances,  make  it  clear 


240  Eaklt  Schools  of  Methodism. 

that,  even  in  preparatory  scliools,  the  most  successful  govern- 
ment is  that  which  controls  by  inspiring  the  students  with  a 
high  sense  of  honor  among  themselves.  The  seminary  pros- 
pered in  all  respects  under  his  oversight.  He  joined  the 
New  York  Conference  in  184:8,  and,  like  his  distinguished 
predecessors,  has  been  so  constantly  in  prominent  positions 
tliat  it  is  not  needful  even  to  give  an  outline  of  his  career. 
After  thirty-three  years  of  active  service  he  died  in  Oregon, 
in  1881,  while  on  an  episcopal  visit  to  that  State. 

Concerning  this  period  a  few  words  from  Bishop  Foss  will 
be  most  welcome.     He  says  : 

Amenia  Seminary,  in  its  best  days,  was  electric  with  marvelous  in- 
fluences for  good — intellectual,  moral,  and  spiritual.  Its  routine  work 
of  instruction  was  well  done — generally  very  well — but  this  was  tran- 
scended by  greater  work  in  the  development  of  character.  Its  faculty 
was  pervaded  by  a  high  enthusiasm  for  the  best  attainments  in  mind 
and  heart,  and  the  ennobling  contagion  seized  and  transformed  many 
a  listless  and  wayward  student.  Into  this  garden  of  choicest  influ- 
ences, at  the  age  of  fourteen,  I  was  led,  together  with  two  of  my 
brothers.  Erastus  O.  Haven,  a  genial  gentleman,  an  elegant  man  of  let- 
ters, and  mellifluous  orator,  was  my  first  principal.  Among  the  teach- 
ers (academy  teachers  were  not  ' '  professors  "  in  those  primitive  times) 
were  the  quiet,  saintly  invalid,  "Uncle  Tommy"  Underwood;  the 
suniiy-faced,  golden-haired,  witty,  brilliant  Gilbert  Haven;  and  the 
slender,  perpendicular,  enthusiastic  William  M.  Ingraham,  fresh  from 
college,  only  twenty  years  of  age,  such  a  prodigy  (to  me)  in  mathe- 
matics (my  favorite  department)  that  he  easily  took  rank  as  first  among 
my  demi-gods,  so  that  many  years  later  his  presence  before  my  pulpit 
would  embarrass  me  more  than  that  of  almost  any  other  man. 

Mr.  E.  O.  Haven  was  succeeded,  as  principal,  by  his  brill- 
iant and  scholarly  cousin,  Rev.  Gilbert  Haven,  to  whom 
Bishop  Foss  alludes.  The  following  named  persons  were  his 
associates  :  Thomas  P.  Underwood;  James  E.  Marsh,  his  col- 


Amenia  Seminary.  247 

loi^e  classmate ;  Alexander  WinclicU,  the  now  distinguished 
scientist;  Horatio  N.  Powers,  George  G.  Jones,  and  Jolm 
W.  Beach.  Mrs.  Caroline  G.  Randall  was  preceptress ;  and 
Miss  Susan  M.  Field,  Miss  Elizabeth  A.  Yail,  Miss  Julia  F. 
Lines,  Miss  Elipha  B.  Allerton,  and  Miss  Frances  J.  Merrill 
were  also  members  of  the  faculty. 

Mr.  Gilbert  Haven  was  born  in  Maiden,  Mass.,  and  pursued 
his  studies  at  Wilbraham  and  Middletown,  where  he  was  grad- 
uated in  1846.  He  came  from  the  university  to  Amenia,  and 
for  two  years  taught  the  ancient  languages  with  an  enthusi- 
asm which  won  the  highest  success.  Like  Clark,  Ciunmings, 
and  E.  O.  Haven,  who  preceded  him  in  the  principalship,  he 
was  licensed  to  preach  after  coming  to  Amenia.  His  earliest 
efforts  in  the  seminary  chapel  were  doubtless  able,  but  to  the 
students  they  were  not  always  interesting.  His  sentences 
were  long  and  involved,  and  his  rhetoric,  though  often  spark- 
ling, was  still  in  strong  contrast  with  the  colloquial,  limpid 
style  of  his  cousin.  Every  body  knows  that  in  later  life  lie 
was,  botli  in  his  addresses  and  his  sermons,  quite  able  to  make 
himself  promptly  and  perfectly  understood,  but  it  was  not  so 
Avhen  he  began  his  ministry.  As  a  teacher  of  moral  science 
and  tlie  helles-lettres  he  had  great  success,  and  his  administra- 
tion of  the  affairs  of  the  institution  received  and  deserved 
high  commendation.  He  left  Amenia  and  joined  the  New 
England  Conference  in  185L  Few  men  in  this  land,  or  in 
tlie  world,  have  been  as  widely  known  and  as  tenderly  loved 
as  he  ;  and  his  life  of  great  achievements  ended  triumphantly 
in  ISSO  at  the  place  of  ]iis  birth. 

Mr.  Haven  was  followed  by  Rev.  John  W.  Beach,  M.A., 
who,  like  all  his  predecessors,  except  the  Urst,  was  edu- 
cated at  Middletown.  His  associates  were  H«)ratio  N. 
Powei*8,  Edwin  H.  Cole,  Jasper  Tenney,  Andrew  J.  Hunt, 


248  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Simeon  F.  Chester,  Thompson  II.  Landon,  Ralph  C.  Har- 
rison, and  Henry  I.  Taylor;  and,  in  tlie  female  depart- 
ment. Miss  Elizabeth  A.  Yail,  Miss  Elipha  B.  Allerton, 
Miss  Frances  J.  Merrill,  Miss  Louisa  E.  Landon,  Miss  Cor- 
nelia E.  Eichards,  Miss  Sarah  North,  and  Miss  Eliza  S. 
Mitchell.  Miss  Yail  and  Miss  Landon  successively  filled  the 
position  of  preceptress.  Mr.  Beach  had  already  gained  a 
very  honorable  reputation  in  the  seminary,  not  only  for  his 
skill  in  teaching,  but  for  his  ability  as  a  preacher;  and,  dar- 
ing the  three  years  that  the  institution  was  under  his  over- 
sight, its  well-earned  popularity  was  not  only  maintained, 
but  increased.  The  number  of  scholars  was  never  larger 
than  during  his  administration.  He  joined  the  New  York 
Conference  in  1854,  and,  after  a  quarter  of  a  century  of 
service  in  the  pastorate,  was  elected,  in  1880,  to  succeed 
Bishop  Foss  as  president  of  the  Wesley  an  University. 

The  Rev.  Andrew  J.  Hunt,  A.M.,  was  elected  to  fill  the 
vacancy  occasioned  by  the  retirement  of  Mr.  Beach.  For 
the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the  seminary  the  principal 
was  a  member  of  an  Annual  Conference,  rendering  service 
under  Episcopal  appointment.  The  gentlemen  associated 
with  Mr.  Hunt  were  Raljih  C.  Harrison,  Cyrus  D.  Foss, 
Edward  B.  Otheman,  Albert  D.  Yail,  and  Henry  I.  Taylor ; 
while  the  ladies  were  Miss  Louisa  E.  Landon,  Miss  Sarah 
North,  Miss  Sarali  J.  Ingraliam,  Miss  Adelaide  E.  Beecher, 
and  Miss  Mary  B.  Rundall.  Miss  Landon  was  the  precep- 
tress during  the  first,  and  Miss  Rundall  during  the  second, 
year  of  his  administration.  Of  him  I- could  say  much,  for  I 
knew  much  about  the  spirit  and  aim  of  his  work ;  but  he 
was  my  only  brother,  and  it  will  better  become  me  to  be 
silent.  He  wrote  w^liile  he  was  principal :  "My  ideal  of  the 
Christian  school-master  presents  him  as  at  once  pastor,  teach- 


Amkn[a  Skmixakv.  '  249 

cr,  and  friend — watching  over  a  flock,  teaching  and  training 
scholars,  and,  above  all,  loving  the  dear  boys,  and  rejoicing 
with  them  in  their  youth  and  growing  manhood." 

One  who  was  associated  with  him  at  Amenia  may  be  per- 
mitted to  pay  his  tribute  to  his  friend.     Bishop  Foss  says  : 

Andrew  J.  Hunt  was  one  of  the  best  and  ablest  men  I  have  ever 
intimately  known.  As  teacher,  principal,  preacher,  and  pastor,  his 
work  in  the  seminary  was  of  the  choicest  quality.  The  unostentatious 
and  unconscious  influence  of  genuine  manliness  drew  to  him  both  col- 
leagues and  pupils  with  cords  soft  as  silk  and  strong  as  steel.  Round- 
about common-sense,  combined  with  artistic  fine  sense ;  will-strength, 
tempered  with  almost  womanly  delicacy ;  accurate  scholarship  and  wide 
culture;  deep  devotedness  and  lofty  adoration;  genuine  humanness 
and  meek  saintliness,  met  and  mingled  in  the  character  of  this  choice 
friend  and  colleague  of  my  early  manhood. 

I  have  long  believed  that  only  the  early  and  helpless  wreck  of  his 
health  debarred  him  from  an  honored  place  among  the  very  foremost 
pastors  and  educators  in  the  land.  Where  **the  inhabitants  never  say, 
I  am  sick,"  he  has  his  opportunity. 

Mr.  Hunt  retired  from  the  principalship  in  the  spring  of 
1856,  having  held  the  office  for  two  years.  Several  times 
after  this  he  made  fruitless  efforts  to  do  the  work  of  a  well 
man,  and  after  a  quarter  of  a  century  of  such  service  as 
those  can  render  "  who  only  stand  and  wait,"  he  passed 
away. 

All  efforts  to  And  catalogues  covering  the  period  we  have 

now  reached  have  proved  unavailing,  but  a  few  facts  have 

liecn  gathered  from  other  sources.     Mr.  Hunt  was  succeeded 

by  Rev.  Cyrns  D.  Foss,  who  had  been  for  nearly  two  years  a 

inomber  of  the  faculty.     He  and  his  two  brothers  pursued 

tlicir  i^reparatory  course  at  Amenia  and  were  graduated  at 

Miildlctown  :  Archibald  two  3'cars  before  him,  jnid  Williaiii 
11* 


250  -Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

two  years  after  him,  and  each  of  the  three  with  the  highest 
honors  of  his  class.  The  new  principal,  being  but  twentj- 
two  years  of  age,  was  much  the  youngest  man  who  had  occu- 
pied the  position,  but  he  duly  appreciated  the  dignity  and  im- 
portance of  the  trust  committed  to  him.  He  was  conscien- 
tious and  thoroughly  in  earnest,  and  his  pupils  gained  enlarge- 
ment and  inspiration  from  his  teachings  and  his  life.  He  was 
exceedingly  popular  in  the  pulpit,  and  sermons  which  he 
preached  in  the  seminary  chapel  and  elsewhere  in  the  vicin- 
ity are  still  remembered  for  their  remarkable  unction  and 
power.  His  eagerness  to  enter  the  pastoral  work  made  him 
unwilling  to  remain  at  Amenia  after  a  single  year  of  service, 
and  accordingly  he  joined  the  New  York  Conference  in  1857. 
What  he  has  been  doing  since  then  is  known  to  the  entire 
Church. 

Mr.  Foss  was  followed  by  Eev.  John  W.  Armstrong,  a 
member  of  the  Black  Eiver  Conference.  Mr.  Armstrong  was 
a  native  of  England,  but  came  to  this  country  in  his  boy- 
hood. He  had  been  identified  successfully  with  the  Gouver- 
neur,  Falley,  and  Cazenovia  Seminaries,  either  as  principal  or 
instructor.  At  Amenia  he  proved  himself  to  be  a  man  of 
large  acquirements  and  of  decided  ability. 

The  wide-spread  depression  in  the  business  world,  wdiich 
followed  the  panic  of  1857,  doubtless  had  its  influence  in  pre- 
cipitating a  crisis  in  the  affairs  of  the  institution.  The  seri- 
ous embarrassment,  however,  which  marked  this  period  of 
its  history,  it  is  believed,  was  the  outgrowth  of  two  radical 
facts,  namely :  that  the  property  was  owned  by  a  stock  com- 
pany, and  that  the  patronage  of  the  New  York  Conference, 
valuable  as  it  was  in  many  respects,  was  yet  more  nominal 
than  real.  This  is  not  spoken  in  the  spirit  of  criticism,  and 
it  is  useless  to  declare  "  what  might  liave  been."     It  is  well 


Amenia  Seminary.  251 

known  tliat,  after  a  successful  and  even  brilliant  history  of 
more  than  twenty  years,  the  seminary  passed  into  private 
hands. 

The  fortunes  of  the  institution  from  that  time  until  now 
have  been  varied,  but  the  plan  of  this  volume  forbids  us  to 
trace  its  history  under  its  changed  auspices,  and,  if  it  were 
not  so,  the  necessary  data  for  continuinpj  the  story  of  its  work 
are  wanting. 

It  would  be  pleasant,  before  concluding,  to  pay  tribute  to 
the  fidelity  and  success  of  such  teachers  as  Daniel  P.  Kidder, 
Edward  Cooke,  Stephen  M.  Vail,  Joseph  Denison,  Alexander 
Winchell,  William  M.  Ingraham,  Horatio  N.  Powers,  and 
others,  who,  at  different  periods,  were  members  of  the  fac- 
ulty at  Am<?nia.  They  have  all  been  conspicuous  in  other 
fields  of  Christian  endeavor.  But- it  may  be  doubted  whether 
they  have  ever  made  friends  who  will  cherish  their  memory 
more  fondly  than  it  is  cherished  by  certain  well-meaning  but 
often  thoughtless  boys,  who  tested  their  patience  aforetime 
at  Amenia. 

This  paper  would  be  un pardonably  deficient  if  it  failed  to 
allude  to  the  bright  succession  of  Christian  women  who  filled 
the  honorable  position  of  preceptress.  Their  names  have 
been  given  in  preceding  paragraphs,  and  it  is  a  matter  of 
regret  that  our  limits  forbid  us  to  enlarge  upon  their  rare 
merits.  If  they  were  not  all  equally  gifted  and  equally 
successful,  still  eacii  rendered  useful  and  honorable  service, 
and  the  influence  exerted  by  two  or  three  of  them  was  truly 
extraordinary. 

The  names  of  Amenia  students  who  liave  become  useful, 
and  even  distinguished,  in  the  various  walks  of  life,  would 
crowd  many  pages.  Bishop  Clark  declared  that  he  met  his 
scholars  wlierever  he  went.     They  occupy  positions  of  dig- 


252  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

nitj  and  trust  in  Church  and  State,  in  our  own  land  and  in 
other  lands,  a  great  and  goodlj  company. 

Dr.  Alexander  Winchell,  of  the  Michigan  University, 
writes  to  me: 

How  beneficent  has  been  the  influence  of  the  old  seminary!  An 
institution  which  supplied  the  highest  grade  of  academic  instruction 
to  hundreds  of  pupils  for  many  years  in  succession,  at  cheap  rates, 
without  ostentation  or  extravagance,  and  won  the  hearts  of  all  its 
pupils,  and  inculcated  and  exemplified  the  noblest  principles  of  virtue 
and  religion,  was  one  worthy  of  perpetuation.  It  performed  an  office 
wliich  I  venture  to  think  is  not  as  well  filled  by  the  more  costly  and 
ostentatious  schools  which  have  superseded  it.  As  we,  who  have  been  a 
part  of  that  history,  look  back  over  the  thronged  procession  of  earnest 
young  people,  how  guileless  and  high-toned  they  seem.  They  were 
hot  with  the  fire  of  youth,  but  how  few  were  their  infractions  of  duty! 
how  venial  were  the  peccadillos  which  they  committed.  Undoubtedly 
the  character  and  intent  of  the  earliest  promoters  of  the  institution  gave 
it  a  bent  and  predisposition  which  lacked  attraction  for  the  self-indul- 
gent and  the  trifling.  The  seminary  exerted  a  selective  agency  in  call- 
ing into  its  service  and  under  its  instruction  a  grade  of  moral  and  in- 
tellectual endowment  best  fitted  to  become  of  substantial  service  to 
Christian  civilization.  Thank  God  for  what  Amenia  Seminary  has 
been  ! 

We  repeat  the  names  of  the  Amenia  principals :  Charles 
K.  True,  D.D.,  Frederick  Merrick,  Bishop  Davis  W.  Clark, 
D.D.,  Joseph  Cummings,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Bishop  Erastus  O. 
Haven,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Bishop  Gilbert  Haven,  John  W. 
Beach,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Andrew  J.  Hunt,  A.M.,  Bishop  Cyrus 
D.  Foss,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  John  W.  Armstrong,  D.D.  Com- 
ment would  be  superfluous.     The  bare  list  is  eloquent. 


AsBUKY  College  of  De  Tauw  University.       ^53 


CHAPTEE  XIII. 

ASBURY  (X)LLEGE  OF  DE  PAUW  UNITKRSITY. 

BT  MISS  IRENE  HABTIN. 

The  pioneer  Methodist  preachers  of  Indiana  were  wise 
men  in  their  day  and  generation.  In  more  than  one  respect 
tlieir  counsel  and  actions  went  far,  not  only  toward  planting 
the  religion  of  Clirist  in  their  own  borders,  but  also  toward 
the  early  development  of  the  rich  resources  of  the  State. 
Nor  was  this  influence  confined  to  Indiana.  Their  spirit 
largely  pervaded  the  farther  West,  and  tended  to  give  it  that 
influence  in  Church  and  State  which  justly  belongs  to  the 
great  heart  of  the  nation.  This  was  not  the  result  of  any 
scheme  or  plan,  in  questionable  aspects  of  those  words,  but 
the  legitimate  consequence  of  that  divine  guidance  which  is 
promised  and  given  to  those  who,  with  single  eye,  desire  to 
know  and  do  that  which  will  best  promote  the  glory  of  God 
and  the  good  of  mankind. 

The  course  which  they  were  led  to  take  in  regard  to  edu- 
cation illustrates  and  confirms  these  statements,  and  is  a  fit 
example  of  what  might  be  shown  in  other  matters  also.  The 
records  show  that  at  the  first  session  of  the  Indiana  Confer- 
ence the  relation  of  the  Church  to  this  great  interest  was 
considered,  and  the  duty  of  the  Church  to  do  something  for 
its  promotion  was  deeply  felt.  As  yet,  however,  Methodism 
in  this  State  was  comparatively  weak,  and  the  same,  only  in 
larger  degree,  might  be  said  of  the  other  Churches.  Its 
preaching  places  were  few  and  far  between,  its  membei-ship 
dwelt  in  the  "  log-cabin,"  and  its  ministers  were  rich  in  the 


254  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

possession  of  a  good  liorse  and  a  capacious  pair  of  "  saddle- 
bags"— one  end  of  wliicli  contained  the  needful  changes  of 
linen,  and  the  other  the  preacher's  Bible,  hymn  book,  Dis- 
cipline, and  a  few  good  books  for  study  or  for  sale. 

The  State  University  had  been  recently  established,  and 
had  practically  been  taken  possession  of  by  those  unfriendly, 
if  not  hostile,  to  Methodism.  Misrepresenting  its  doctrines, 
ridiculing  its  usages,  and  denouncing  its  preachers  as  ignorant 
and  fanatical  disturbers  of  the  peace  and  order  of  society, 
these  good  people  complacently  arrogated  to  themselves  a 
monopoly  of  learning,  and  the  exclusive  ability  and  right  to 
teach  in  the  departments  of  advanced  instruction.  It  is  a 
fact  that,  although  Methodism  had  in  its  ministry  and  mem- 
bership and  friends  nearly  as  many  as  all  the  other  Churches 
in  the  State,  they  were,  by  careful  management,  excluded 
from  any  representation  in  the  board  of  trustees,  or  the  chairs 
of  instruction  in  the  chief  institution  of  learning,  established 
and  maintained  at  the  expense  of  all  the  people  in  the  Com- 
monwealth. 

The  right  adjustment  of  this  matter  was  felt,  by  those 
subjected  to  the  outrage,  to  be  the  first  thing  that  ought  to 
be  attempted.  A  respectful  memorial  was,  therefore,  drawn 
up  by  the  Conference,  and  a  committee  appointed  to  present 
the  same  at  the  next  session  of  the  Legislature.  This  was 
accordingly  done.  The  deputation  was  respectfully  received, 
their  statement,  which  none  could  call  in  question,  heard, 
and  the  subject  duly  referred  to  a  committee.  The  matter 
was  allowed  to  slumber  till  near  the  close  of  the  session, 
when,  finding  nothing  was  likely  to  be  done,  friends  of  the 
petitioners  became  somewhat  urgent  for  a  redress  of  the 
grievance.  Their  natural  importunity  was  resented,  and  the 
only  answer  v.hich  their  just  complanit  received  was,  "  The 


AsBURY  College  of  De  Pauw  Univeesity.       255 

Methodist  Church  has  only  one  man  in  tlie  country  iit  to  fill 
a  professor's  chair."  This  was  understood  to  refer  to  Hon. 
Chief  Justice  M'Lean,  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United 
States.  The  taunt  was,  in  after  years,  sought  to  be  explained 
as  a  mere  jest,  but  at  the  time  it  was  felt,  as  it  was  no  doubt 
intended  to  be,  simply  as  adding  insult  to  injury.  Under  the 
circumstances,  Methodism  had  no  option  but  to  start  a  college 
of  its  own.  How  very  serious  such  an  undertaking  was  will 
best  be  understood  when  we  remember  how  sparsely  settled 
Indiana  was ;  that  it  was  still  a  frontier  State,  but  recently 
admitted  into  the  Union  ;  that  its  fields  were  uncleared,  its 
swamps  undrained,  and  its  rivers  and  streams  unbridged. 
The  settlers  had  scarcely  built  their  cabins,  inclosed  their 
fields,  or  opened  up  the  highways.  The  "  itinerant " — liter- 
ally traveling — preachers  had*  frequently  to  find  their  way 
through  pathless  woods,  to  wade  a  waste  of  water,  to  swim 
swollen  streams,  and  sometimes  to  camp  out  at  night  with 
tlie  stars  for  lamps,  the  blue  arch  of  heaven  for  canopy,  and 
the  howling  of  wolves  for  music.  These  are  almost  the 
identical  words  employed  by  the  venerable  Aaron  Wood,  still 
in  the  ranks,  in  giving  an  account  at  my  father's  fireside  of 
a  night  spent  on  one  of  the  northern  prairies  by  himself  and 
Ijishop  Asbury.  Yet,  nothing  daunted,  these  high-hearted 
and  earnest  ministers  of  Christ,  with  faith  in  God  and  man, 
and  wise  prevision  of  the  wants  of  the  Church  in  the  "  great 
valley  "  of  the  world,  resolved  at  once  to  address  themselves 
to  the  work. 

After  various  delays  and  all  sorts  of  obstnictions  and  op- 
position, they  at  last  secured  a  charter  from  the  Legislature. 
Various  names  were  considered  and  seriously  canvassed,  but, 
after  considerable  deliberation,  the  infant  institution  was  in- 
troduced to  the  world  under  the  ample  and  high-sounding 


256  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

title,  "  The  Indiana  Asbury  University."  It  may  be  said  to 
liave  been  founded  in  1835,  when,  in  the  fear  of  God  and  in 
dependence  npon  him  for  direction  and  success,  the  Indiana 
Conference,  after  three  years  of  serious  discussion,  resolved 
to  begin  the  enterprise.  It  was  two  years  later  before  the 
charter  was  gotten  through  the  Legislature.  On  the  10th  of 
January,  1837,  it  received  the  signature  of  tlie  governor,  and 
on  the  20th  of  June,  1837,  the  corner-stone  of  the  first,  and 
for  many  years  the  only,  college  building,  was  laid  with  im- 
posing ceremonies  and  an  eloquent  address  by  Dr.  Henry  B. 
Bascom,  afterward  Bishop  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church, 
South. 

The  hand  of  a  gracious  providence  is  clearly  seen  in  all 
these  movements.  Those  men  saw  in  the  word  of  God  and 
in  the  history  of  the  Church  their  warrant  and  encouragement 
to  undertake  this  work.  They  saw  that  spiritual  culture  and 
mental  illumination  not  only  go  hand  in  hand,  but  the  latter 
is  the  inevitable  and  legitimate  result  of  the  former ;  that 
sanctified  Christian  education  is  as  essential  to  the  building 
up  of  the  Church  of  Christ  in  the  world  as  is  conversion. 
In  short,  that  the  Church  which  neglects  its  duty  in  this  re- 
spect, or  trusts  in  any  other  agency  to  do  its  share  in  this 
business,  is  doomed  to  extinction.  Trusting  to  the  family, 
the  pulpit,  and  the  Sunday-school  for  the  religious  training 
of  the  youth  in  their  earlier  years,  they  felt  that  their  higher 
education  should  be  carried  on  under  distinctly  religious  in- 
fluence and  direction.  The  constant  tendency  of  State  col- 
leges to  discourage  every  thing  like  an  earnest  Cliristian  life 
has  shown  the  wisdom  of  their  action,  and  the  gracious  spir- 
itual results  of  that  action  have  amply  confirmed  and  justi- 
fied it. 

Various  places  contended  for  the  location  of  the  institution. 


AsBURY  College  of  De  Pauw  University.       257 

Many  considerations  led  to  the  selection  of  Greencastle,  at 
that  time  an  inconsiderable  village  about  thirty-eight  miles 
directly  west  of  Indianapolis,  and  the  chief  town  of  Putnam 
County.  The  ground  originally  was  heavily  timbered,  the 
soil  rich  and  underlaid  by  limestone,  the  surface  somewhat 
rolling,  and  the  surrounding  region  healthy  and  beautifully 
picturesque.  A  place  better  suited  or  more  inviting  for 
quiet  and  successful  study  is  nowhere  to  be  found. 

The  first  faculty  entered  upon  duty  September,  1839.  It 
consisted  of  the  following,  namely :  Eev.  Matthew  Simp- 
son, D.D.,  president  and  professor  of  mathematics ;  Rev. 
Cyrus  Nutt,  A.M.,  professor  of  languages;  Rev.  John 
AVeakly,  principal  of  preparatory  department ;  John  Wheel- 
er, tutor. 

In  a  year  from  the  above  date  Rev.  W.  C.  Larrabee,  A.M., 
was  made  professor  of  mathematics  and  science,  and  in  1842 
Rev.  John  Wheeler,  A.M.,  was  elected  to  the  chair  of  Latin, 
Professor  Nutt' retaining  that  of  Greek.  At  the  same  time 
Charles  G.  Downey,  A.M.,  was  elected  to  the  chair  of  natural 
science.  Professor  Larrabee  retaining  that  of  mathematics. 
In  1844  Professor  Nutt  resigned  the  chair  of  Greek,  and 
Rev.  B.  F.  Teft,  D.D.,  was  chosen  to  succeed  him.  Pro- 
fessor Nutt  was  a  graduate  of  Allegheny  College,  class  of 
1837,  and  was  properly  regarded  as  the  first  teacher  of  the 
college  —  his  private  school  in  Greencastle  having  been 
adopted  as  the  preparatory  department.  He  was  long  and 
honorably  engaged  in  the  work  of  education  in  Indiana.  In 
1861  he  was  elected  president  of  the  State  University,  which 
position  he  retained  until  within  a  few  months  of  his  death, 
which  took  place  in  1875.  Those  who  had  made  light  of 
Methodist  teachers  were  glad  to  secure  his  valuable  services 
to  save  their  institution  from  collapse. 


258  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

On  July  18,  1843,  Dr.  Simpson  tendered  liis  resignation, 
having  been  elected  editor  of  the  "  Western  Christian  Ad- 
vocate." He  was  born  at  Cadiz,  Ohio,  June  20,  1811,  of 
Scotch-Irish  descent,  and  accomplished  the  course  of  study 
at  Madison  College,  near  Pittsburg,  Pa.  In  183Y  he  was 
elected  vice-president  and  professor  of  natural  science  in  Al- 
legheny College,  whence  he  was  transferred,  as  above,  to  the 
head  of  what  w^as  destined  to  become  the  great  Methodist 
school  of  the  West.  In  1852  he  was  elected  Bishop,  and  in 
that  office  he  served  God  and  his  generation  until,  in  1884, 
he  fell  asleep  in  Christ.  Under  his  administration  the  col- 
lege received  an  impetus  which,  with  ever-increasing  power, 
it  still  continues  to'* enjoy. 

Eev.  Lucien  W.  Berry,  A.M.,  was  elected  president  July 
14,  1849.  He  was  a  native  of  Alburg,  Vermont,  born  in 
1815  ;  entered  the  Indiana  Conference  in  1838  ;  continued  in 
charge  of  the  college  about  six  years,  w^hen  he  w^as  transferred 
to  the  presidency  of  Iowa  Wesleyan  University.  Here  he  re- 
mained three  years,  w^hen  he  took  charge  of  an  incipient  col- 
lege at  Jefferson  City,  Mo.  He  died  at  Cincinnati,  July  23, 
1858. 

On  July  15,  1850,  Joseph  Tingley,  A.M.,  was  elected 
professor  of  natural  science.  Professor  Downey  having  re- 
signed ;  as  did  also  Dr.  Teft,  in  1850,  who  was  succeeded  by 
Eev.  Henry  C.  Benson,  A.M.  In  1852  Miles  J.  Fletcher 
was  made  professor  of  English  literature,  and  the  same  year 
Saniuel  A.  Lattimore,  A.M.,  was  chosen  to  fill  the  vacancy 
caused  by  the  resignation  of  Prof.  Benson.  In  July,  1853, 
Rev.  William  [N'ast,  D.D.,  was  elected  professor  of  German  ; 
and,  July,  1859,  Professors  Wheeler  and  Fletcher  having 
resigned,  Eev.  E.  E.  Bragdon,  A.M.,  was  elected  professor  of 
Latin,  and  Eev.  Bernard  II.  Nadal,  A.M.,  professor  of  En- 


AsBURY  College  of  De  Pauw  University.        259 

glisli  literature.  At  tlie  same  time  Professor  H.  B.  Hibben 
was  made  adjunct  professor  of  languages. 

President  Berry  having  resigned,  Rev.  Daniel  Curry,  D.D., 
was  elected  president  August  17,  1855.  Dr.  Curry  was  born 
near  Peekskill,  X.  Y.,  November  26,  1809 ;  was  graduated 
from  the  Wesleyan  Univei*sity,  1837;  was  principal  of  the 
Troy  Conference  Academy,  professor  in  the  Georgia  Female 
College,  filled,  as  pastor,  several  of  the  principal  charges  in 
Georgia  and  New  York  Conferences,  until,  as  above,  he  was 
chosen  president  of  the  college  at  Greencastle.  He  remained 
here  three  years,  when  he  re-entered  the  New  York  East 
Conference,  and  is  well  known  as  a  man  tried  and  found 
fait) if ul  in  the  vanous  departments  of  Church  work,  especially 
as  an  editor  and  writer  of  books. 

Professor  Downey  resigned  in  July,  1857,  and  Dr.  Nadal 
on  June  29,  1858,  and  Professor  Bragdon  at  the  same  date. 
In  July,  1857,  Dr.  Cyrus  Nutt  was  made  professor  of  math- 
ematics ;  Miles  J.  Fletcher,  professor  of  helles-lettres  and  his- 
toiy ;  Benjamin  T.  Hoyt,  A.M.,  professor  of  Latin ;  and  H. 
B.  Hibben,  adjunct  professor  of  Latin. 

On  June  28,  1859,  Rev.  Thomas  Bowman,  D.D.,  was  in- 
augurated president,  to  succeed  Dr.  Curry,  and  continued  in 
charge  until  May,  1872,  when  he  was  elected  Bishop.  Dr. 
Bowman  was  born  near  Berwick,  Pa.,  July  15,  1817 ;  was 
graduated  at  Dickinson  College  in  1837 ;  joined  the  Balti- 
more Conference  in  1839 ;  taught  for  some  time  in  his  almor 
mater  •  was  president  of  Dickinson  Seminary  for  ten  years; 
liad  charge  of  the  institution  at  Greencastle,  as  above,  for 
fourteen  years,  and  is  at  this  writing  (1885)  the  beloved  and 
honored  senior  Bishop  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 

In  June,  1860,  Professor  Lattimore  resigned  the  chair  of 
Greek,  and   Dr.  Nutt  that   of  mathematics.      August  28, 


260  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

1860,  Eev.  Philander  Wilej,  M.A.,  was  elected  to  succeed 
Professor  Lattimore,  and  Eev.  John  W.  Locke,  A.M.,  to  suc- 
ceed Dr.  Nutt.  June  24,  1863,  Professor  Hojt  was  trans- 
ferred to  the  chair  of  lelles-lettres  and  history,  Rev.  John  A. 
Reubelt,  D.D.,  to  that  of  Latin  and  German,  and  L.  L. 
Rogers,  A.M.,  made  adjunct  professor  of  Latin,  who,  in 
1869,  succeeded  to  the  full  duties  of  that  chair.  Dr.  Reubelt 
having  resigned.  On  June  30, 1869,  John  C.  Ridpath,  A.M., 
was  elected  professor  of  English  literature  and  normal  instruc- 
tion. June  29,  1870,  John-  E.  Earp,  A.M.,  w^as  elected  pro- 
fessor of  modern  languages  and  Hebrew.  June  18,  1871, 
the  first  ladies  were  graduated  from  the  university,  having 
been  admitted  to  all  its  departments  four  years  previously. 
In  June,  1872,  Dr.  Locke  resigned  the  chair  of  mathematics, 
and  Rev.  Patterson  M'Nutt,  D.D.,  was  elected  to  fill  his 
place. 

On  July  13,  1872,  Rev.  Reuben  Andrus,  D.D.,  was  elected 
to  succeed  Bishop  Bowman  as  president.  We  are  not  in 
possession  of  the  date  of  his  birth,  or  the  cliief  facts  in  his 
life.  He  filled  a  term  of  three  laborious  and  useful  years. 
Under  his  administration  there  were  no  changes,  either  in 
the  way  of  resignations  or  additions  to  the  faculty.  He 
resigned,  to  re-enter  the  pastorate,  September,  1875,  and  at 
the  same  date  Rev.  Alexander  Martin,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  the 
present  incumbent,  w\as  elected  as  his  successor. 

President  Martin  was  born  in  Nairn,  Scotland,  January 
22,  1824 ;  was  graduated  from  Allegheny  College  in  1847 ; 
w^as  received  into  the  Pittsburg  Conference,  and  appointed 
professor  in  the  North-west  Virginia  Academy  the  same 
year.  Served  for  several  years  as  secretary  of  the  West  Yir- 
ginia  Conference,  was  stationed  at  Charleston,  Moundsville, 
Parkersburg,  and  Wheeling.     Served  ten  years  as  professor 


AsBURY  College  of  De  Pauw  UnivepwBity.        261 

of  Greek  in  Alleglieny  College.  Organized,  and  for  seven 
years  presided  over,  the  West  Virginia  State  University,  and 
on  his  resignation  there  was  elected  to  his  present  position. 
His  administration  was  for  a  time  embarrassed  by  the  fact 
that  students  were  crowding  to  the  halls  of  the  college  in 
greater  numbers  than  there  were  means  to  provide  for  their 
proper  instruction.  Sometime  before  the  authorities  re- 
solved not  to  charge  tuition  fees,  so  there  was  no  income 
from  that  source.  The  rate  of  interest  on  vested  funds  was 
steadily  diminishing,  the  erection  of  an  expensive  building, 
costing  over  $100,000,  absorbed,  as  a  loan  from  the  Endow- 
ment to  the  Building  Fund,  some  $18,000.  About  one-half 
of  the  remaining  endowment  was,  for  live  years,  rendered 
unproductive  by  the  railroad  in  whose  bonds  it  had  been 
invested  being  put  into  the  hands  of  a  receiver,  and,  on  the 
whole,  the  institution  had  to  pass  through  deep  waters. 
Had  it  not  been  that  very  considerable  additions  were  being 
secured  to  the  endowment  and  other  funds,  tlie  prospect 
would  have  been  gloomy. 

But  in  the  darkest  hour,  God  put  it  into  the  heart  of 
Hon.  W.  C.  De  Pauw  to  respond  to  appeals  from  many  quar- 
tei-s  to  lift,  as  he  was  well  able,  the  institution  not  only  out 
of  its  monetary  embarrassments,  but  to  make  it  not  only  a  col- 
lege, which  it  always  had  been,  but  a  university,  in  fact  as 
well  as  name,  and  with  all  the  departments  which  justify  any 
school  to  be  so  called.  It  would  occupy  too  much  space  to 
enter  into  the  negotiations  which  eventuated  in  this  happy 
result.  In  the  university  founded  by  Mr.  De  Pauw,  the 
"  Asbury  College  of  Liberal  Arts,"  with  its  four  departments 
of  instruction — classical,  philosophical,  scientific,  and  that  of 
literature  and  art — continues  to  occupy  the  place  of  honor  as 
the  center  of  the  other  schools,  and  the  foundation  on  which 


262  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

they  rest.  These  are  schools  of  theology,  law,  military  sci- 
ence and  tactics,  music,  the  fine  arts,  horticultm-e,  the  nor- 
mal school,  and  the  preparatory  school.  Negotiations  are 
being  had  whereby,  it  is  hoped,  the  "  School  of  Medicine  " 
will  be  organized  at  an  early  day.  The  grounds  of  the  uni- 
versity embrace  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  acres.  The 
east  college,  built  in  1876,  is  an  imposing,  tasteful,  and  spa- 
cious structure,  one  hundred  and  twenty-six  feet  long  by 
ninety-four  wide,  and  four  stories  high.  It  is  finished  with 
mansard  roof,  and  ornamented  by  three  handsome  towers. 
The  west  college,  erected  in  1879,  is  even  more  capacious, 
and  finely  arranged  for  university  work.  Besides  these  there 
are  four  other  fine  buildings,  recently  erected,  including  the 
M'Kim  Astronomical  Observatory,  and  some  structures  of 
less  account.  The  attendance  of  students  is  steadily  increas- 
ing, being,  in  1884:-85,  six  hundred  and  eighty,  the  number 
of  graduates  the  same  year,  sixty-two. 

In  the  faculty  of  instruction  and  government  more  than 
fifty  professors  and  teachers  are  employed.  The  alurnni 
are  now  filling  the  most  exalted  positions  in  all  parts  of  the 
land.  Colonel  James  Harlan,  of  Iowa ;  Judge  Dunbar,  of 
Kentucky ;  Chancellor  Sims,  of  Syracuse  University ;  Pro- 
fessor S.  A.  Lattimore,  of  Rochester  University ;  Governor 
Porter  and  Senator  Yoorhees,  of  Indiana ;  Governor  Booth, 
of  California ;  and  scores  of  others  equally  conspicuous  are 
graduates  of  earlier  years.  The  alumni  now  number  about 
one  thousand,  besides  many  thousands  more  who,  in  greater 
or  less  degree,  have  been  partakers  of  the  benefit.  They  are 
found  in  all  parts  of  the  world,  and  in  all  the  industrial  pur- 
suits as  well  as  the  liberal  professions  of  life. 


Victoria  University.  2G3 


CHAPTER  XIY. 

VICTORIA    UNIVERSITY,    CANADA. 

BY  PROFESSOR  NATHANIEL  BURWASH,  8.T.D. 

The  first  year  of  the  organization  of  American  Methodism, 
under  Coke  and  Asbury,  witnessed  the  formation  of  Method- 
ist classes  by  settlers  in  the  wilds  of  Upper  Canada.  Three 
yeai-s  later  the  itinerants  followed,  and  in  1791  a  circuit  was 
reported,  with  five  classes  and  one  hundred  and  sixty- five 
members.  For  forty  years  the  work  of  Methodism  in  this 
new  country  was  missionary  and  evangelistic,  building  up  a 
Conference  of  some  fifty  ministers,  providing  for  the  relig- 
ious wants  of  more  than  ten  thousand  members  of  the  Meth- 
odist Church,  and  about  one  fourth  the  population  of  the 
country.  The  time  had  now  arrived  for  the  organization, 
consolidation,  and  perfecting  of  the  work  founded  by  tliese- 
forty  years  of  heroic  labor. 

In  1828  the  American  Methodists,  following  the  example 
set  by  John  Wesley  in  1784,  recognized  the  separate  political 
relations  of  their  brethren  in  Canada,  and  placed  them  in  that 
position  of  brotherly  independence  which  left  them  free  to 
work  out,  without  embarrassments,  the  problems  assigned  by 
Divine  Providence.  The  year  after  their  separate  organiza- 
tion they  addressed  themselves  to  their  task  in  a  manner  that 
proved  them  to  be  thoroughly  competent  for  their  work.  At 
the  Conference  of  1829  two  things  were  projected  destined 
to  exert  a  most  helpful  influence  on  the  future  of  Canadian 
Methodism.      These  were  a  connectional  newspaper  and  a 


264  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

seminary  of  learning  for  the  education  of  tlie  joutli  and 
ministry  of  tlie  Church. 

These  measures,  wise  and  necessary  under  any  circum- 
stances, were  imperatively  demanded  by  the  peculiar  politico- 
religious  condition  of  the  country  at  that  time.  Those  were 
the  days  of  State  Church  in  Canada,  when  it  was  of  the 
highest  importance  that  the  sentiments  of  the  rising  genera- 
tion should  be  formed  upon  principles  of  civil  and  religious 
liberty,  and  that  the  voice  of  that  sentiment  should  express 
itself,  through  educated  men  and  by  tlie  public  press,  in  such 
a  way  as  to  be  heard  and  felt  in  all  the  land.  The  connec- 
tional  paper  was  the  first  and  easiest  part  of  the  project. 
Providence  had  raised  up  and  trained  the  man  for  the  work  in 
Egerton  Ryerson,  who  had  already  distinguished  Jiimsell:  by 
his  writings  on  behalf  of  the  civil  and  religious  rights  of  the 
Methodist  people.  A  subscription  of  a  few  hundred  dollars  to 
procure  the  needed  outfit  served  at  once  to  bring  into  the  field 
an  engine  of  mighty  moral  power  in  the  history  of  Canada. 

To  found  the  seminary  of  learning  was  a  task  not"  so  easy 
of  completion.  The  Methodists  of  that  time  numbered  few 
men  of  wealth — principally  farmers,  still  engaged  in  the  strug- 
gle  to  create  productive  homesteads  out  of  primitive  forests. 
To  raise  the  $50,000  needed  to  build  and  equip  their  semi- 
nary was  a  more  gigantic  undertaking  than  would  be  the 
raising  of  two  millions  by  the  United  Canadian  Methodism 
of  to-day,  or  of  twenty  millions  by  the  wealthy  Methodism  of 
the  United  States.  But  to  these  fifty  men  of  faith  the  task 
was  God's  command,  and  it  must  be  done.  If  the  work 
placed  in  their  hands  by  God  was  to  be  carried  forward,  a  min- 
istry so  educated  as  not  to  be  disparaged  by  the  side  of  the 
university  men  supplied  to  the  Anglican  and  Presbyterian 
Churches  from  the  old  seats  of  learning  in  Great  Britain 


Victoria  University.  265 

must  be  secured  for  Methodism.  If,  in  the  councils  of  the 
nation  and  in  the  great  politico-religious  questions  of  the  day 
they  were  to  make  their  influence  felt,  their  sons  must  be 
educated.  Under  this  supreme  sense  of  duty,  as  it  must  then 
have  appeared  to  these  fifty  men,  the  work  was  undertaken, 
and,  in  seven  years  from  the  time  of  its  fii-st  mention  in  Con- 
ference, was  completed  free  from  debt.  Of  the  effort  put 
forth  to  bring  about  such  a  consummation,  some  idea  may  be 
formed  from  a  few  sentences  of  a  letter  written  by  the 
chairman  of  the  board  engaged  in  erecting  the  building,  to 
the  Rev.  Egerton  Ryerson,  who  was  then  in  England  solicit- 
ing funds  and  a  royal  charter  for  the  institution :  "  You  must 
stay  in  England  until  the  money  is  got.  Use  ever}^  effort, 
h;irden  your  face  to  flint,  and  give  eloquence  to  your  tongue. 
This  is  your  calling.  Excel  in  it !  Be  not  discouraged  with 
a  dozen  refusals  in  succession.  The  money  must  be  liad,  and 
it  must  be  begged.  My  dear  brother,  work  for  your  life,  and 
I  pray  God  to  give  you  success.  Do  not  borrow,  if  possible. 
Reg,  beg,  beg  it  all.     It  must  be  done." 

Such  was  the  spirit  of  conviction,  and  such  the  effort  of 
ihusc  founders  of  our  Church. 

Tlie  institution  thus  founded  was  opened  for  academic 
work  June  18, 1836,  with  the  Rev.  Matthew  Ricliey  as  prin- 
cipal. Mr.  Ri(;liey  \vi\s  a  native  of  Ireland.  Classically  edu- 
cated in  the  land  of  his  birth,  and  converted  under  the  minis- 
try of  Methodism,  about  twenty  years  before  this  time  he 
emigrated  to  America,  and,  in  the  maritime  provinces,  conse- 
crated his  rare  gifts  of  eloquence  to  the  work  of  the  minis- 
try. Ue  was  a  master  in  pulpit  eloquence.  Splendid  in 
diction,  rich  and  beautiful  in  thought,  luminous  in  exposi- 
tion of  truth,  association  with  him  was  in  itself  an  inspiring 

cduaition  to   the  young  men  of  that  day.     At  the  close  of 
12 


2G6  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

the  first  year  tlie  new  academy  numbered  one  hundred  and 
twenty  students  on  its  roll,  and  was  fully  organized  under 
tlie  royal  charter  granted  October  7,  1836,  by  his  majesty 
King  William  TV. ;  and  was,  by  the  aid  of  a  royal  grant,  free 
from  debt.  During  the  three  years  of  Mr.  Eichey's  presi- 
dency the  Church  already  began  to  reap  the  fruits  of  her 
enterprise  in  the  addition  to  the  ranks  of  the  ministry  of 
such  names  as  G.  K.  Sanderson,  James  Spencer,  and  I.  B. 
Howard,  all  trained  in  the  academy,  and  in  after  years  doing 
honor  to  their  alma  mater.  In  1839  Mr.  Richey  was  suc- 
ceeded by  the  Eev.  Jesse  Hurlburt,  M.A.,  a  graduate  of 
Wesleyan  University,  Middletown,  a  finished  scholar,  and  a 
very  able  educator.  Associated  with  him  was  also  another 
gentleman,  tlien  just  beginning  a  distinguished  career  as  an 
educator,  the  Eev.  D.  C.  Yan  Norman,  M.A.  Under  their 
control  the  academy  continued  to  increase  in  popularity  and 
usefulness  both  to  the  Cliurch  and  to  the  country.  It  was 
during  this  period  that  the  Eev.  H.  B.  Steinhauer,  himself 
an  Indian  of  pure  blood,  laid  the  foundations  of  that  schol- 
arship which  served  him  so  well  in  the  translation  of  the 
entire  Scriptures  into  the  Cree  language  of  our  north-west- 
ern plains,  as  well  as  in  his  long  and  successful  work  as  a 
missionary  teacher  and  preacher.  The  mention  of  such 
names  as  Lieutenant-Governor  Aikins,  Lieutenant-Governor 
Eichey,  M.  B.  Eoblin,  Esq.,  Horace  Yeomans,  Esq.,  Colonel 
Stonghton  Dennis,  A.  E.  Yan  Norman,  and  O.  W.  Powell ; 
with  such  ladies  as  Mrs.  Nathan  Jones,  the  Misses  Adams, 
Mrs.  Youmans,  Mrs.  Judge  McDonald,  and  Mrs.  I.  B.  How- 
ard, will  show,  to  those  acquainted  with  the  inner  history  of 
Canadian  Methodism,  as  well  as  with  our  political  and  social 
life,  how  important  was  the  work  of  this  period,  and  how 
wide-spread  its  influence. 


YicroKiA  University.  267 

After  five  years  of  successful  academic  work,  during  which 
liundreds  of  youth  of  both  sexes  aud  various  religious  dciioui- 
inations  received  a  substantial  education,  Upper  Canada  Acad- 
emy, by  act  of  the  Provincial  Parliament,  was  endowed  with 
university  powers,  and  became,  under  its  extended  royal  char- 
ter, Victoria  College,  on  August  27,  1841.  In  October  of 
that  year  the  Rev.  E.  Ryerson,  D.D.,  was  appointed  the  first 
principal  of  the  college,  and  professor  of  moral  philosophy, 
and  on  the  21st  of  that  month  opened  the  session,  and  com- 
menced his  duties  by  a  public  address  to  the  students.  This 
was  the  first  opening  in  Ontario  o£  an  institution  authorized 
to  confer  degrees.  Queen's  College  and  University  (Presby- 
terian) was  opened  on  the  7th  of  March,  1842 ;  and  King's 
College,  the  then  provincial  college  under  the  control  of  the 
Church  of  England,  on  the  8th  of  June,  1843.  To  the 
Methodist  Church  belongs  the  honor  of  leading  the  way  in 
university  work  in  "Western  Canada. 

During  the  first  year  tlie  management  of  the  incipient 
university  devolved  upon  the  Rev.  Mr.  Hurlburt.  In  June, 
1842,  Dr.  Ryerson,  released  from  external  laboi*s  which  had 
devolved  upon  him,  devoted  himself  more  fully  to  his  college 
work.  The  occasion  was  marked  by  an  inaugural  address 
more  formal  and  comprehensive  than  that  of  the  preceding 
October,  and  setting  forth  the  conception  entertained  by  the 
new  president  of  the  university  training  required  by  the 
Canadian  student.  On  two  points  he  anticipates  the  great 
movement  of  university  reform  of  modern  times.  The  first 
is  the  prominent  position  which  he  assigns  to  the  English 
language  and  literature  as  elements  of  a  university  educa- 
tion. At  the  close  of  several  pages  devoted  to  this  subject, 
lie  says :  "What  I  have  said  is  designed  to  show  that  I  do  not 
uudurvjihic   the  English  classics,  and  the  philosophical   and 


268  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

literary  resources  of  our  own  language,  and  that  youth  who 
cannot  acquire  the  mastery  of  other  tongues  ought  not  to  be 
excluded  from  the  invaluable  mines  of  wisdom  and  knowl- 
edge which  are  contained  in  their  own  tongue." 

The  second  is  the  appreciation  of  the  physical  sciences. 
On  this  point  he  says :  "  The  ph^^sical  sciences  have,  as  yet, 
received  little  attention  in  our  higher  schools  in  this  prov- 
ince. Instruction  has  been  chiefly  confined  to  the  classics, 
and  students  have  acquired  little  or  no  knowledge  of  natural 
philosophy,  chemistry,  mineralogy,  geology,  astronomy,  etc., 
except  what  they  have  obtained  in  another  province  or  in  a 
foreign  country.  If  one  branch  of  education  must  be  omit- 
ted, surely  the  knowledge  of  the  laws  of  the  universe  is  of 
more  practical  advantage,  socially  and  morally,  than  a  knowl- 
edge of  Greek  and  Latin." 

The  magnificent  modern  courses  of  science  in  our  universi- 
ties have  not  passed  beyond  the  limits  here  sketched.  In 
commencing  his  work  Dr.  Ryerson  was  supported  by  a  staff 
of  men  distinguished  for  learning,  but  still  more  for  individ- 
ual abilit}^  as  educators.  Mr.  Hurlburt  became  professor  of 
the  natural  sciences.  Mr.  Yan  Norman,  distinguished  as  a 
grammarian,  became  the  professor  of  classics.  To  these 
were  added  Mr.  William  Kingston,  M.  A.,  whose  reputation 
as  professor  of  mathematics  was  well  known  to  some  thirty 
successive  classes  of  students  in  the  halls  of  Victoria.  In 
addition  to  these  an  English  master  was  employed ;  the  sec- 
ond of  these,  the  Rev.  James  Spencer,  M.  A.,  was  well  known 
afterward  as  a  man  of  mark  in  Canadian  Methodism,  and 
editor  of  the  "  Christian  Guardian."  Dr.  Ryerson  evidently 
understood  that  the  strength  of  an  institution  of  learning 
lies  not  so  much  in  magnificent  buildings  or  expensive 
equipments,  as  in  men  of  rare  ability  as  teachers,  and  in  the 


YicTORTA  University.  269 

selection  of  these  he  was  singularly  fortunate.  Around  such 
a  college  president,  and  such  a  faculty,  there  gathered  at 
once  the  strongest  young  mind  of  the  country.  The  names 
of  Rev.  S.  S.  Nelles,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Rev.  William  Ormiston, 
D.D.,  LL.D.,  Rev.  W.  S.  Griffin,  D.D.,  Hon.  Senator  Brouse, 
M.D.,  Hon.  William  McDougall,  C.B.,  Judge  Springer,  M.A., 
J.  E.  ITodgins,  M.A.,  LL.D.,  deputy  minister  of  education, 
J.  L.  Biggar,  M.P.,  will  be  recognized  as  men  eminent  in 
Church  and  State,  and  in  college  life  and  work,  all  of  whom 
were  students  of  this  period.  Of  Dr.  Ryerson's  work,  as  col- 
lege president,  Dr.  Ormiston  writes: 

In  the  autumn  of  1843  I  went  to  Victoria  College,  doubting  much 
whether  I  was  prepared  to  matriculate  as  a  freshman.  Though  my 
attainments  in  some  of  the  subjects  prescribed  for  examination  were 
far  in  advance  of  the  requirements,  in  other  subjects  I  knew  I  was 
sadly  deficient.  On  the  evening  of  my  arrival,  while  my  mind  was 
hardened  with  the  importance  of  the  step  I  had  taken,  and  by  no 
means  free  from  anxiety  about  the  issue,  Dr.  Ryerson,  at  that  time 
principal  of  the  college,  visited  me  in  my  room.  I  shall  never 
forget  that  interview.  He  took  me  by  the  hand,  and  few  men  could 
express  as  much  by  a  mere  hand-shake  as  he.  It  was  a  welcome,  an 
encouragement,  an  inspiration,  and  an  earnest  of  future  fellowship  and 
friendship.  It  lessened  the  timid  awe  I  naturally  felt  toward  one  in 
so  elevated  a  position.  I  had  never  before  seen  a  principal  of  a  col- 
lege; it  dissipated  all  boyish  awkwardness,  and  awakened  filial  confi- 
dence. He  spoke  of  Scotland,  my  native  land,  and  of  her  noble  sons, 
distinguished  in  every  branch  of  philosophy  and  literature;  specially 
of  the  number,  the  diligence,  the  frugality,  self-denial,  and  success  of 
her  college  students.  In  this  way  he  soon  led  me  to  tell  him  of  my 
parentage,  past  life  and  efforts,  present  hopes  and  aspirations.  His 
manner  was  so  gracious  and  paternal,  his  sympathy  so  quick  and  gen- 
uine, his  counsel  so  ready  and  cheering,  his  assurances  so  grateful  and 
inspiring,  that  not  only  was  my  heart  his  from  that  hour,  but  my  future 
career  seemed  brighter  and  more  certain  than  it  had  ever  appeared 
before. 


270  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Dr.  Ryerson  was  at  that  time  in  the  prime  of  a  magnificent  man- 
hood, his  mental  powers  vigorous  and  well  disciplined,  his  attainments 
in  literature  varied  and  extensive,  his  experience  extended  and  diversi- 
fied, his  fame  as  a  preacher  of  great  pathos  and  power  widely  spread. 
...  As  a  teacher,  he  was  earnest  and  efficient,  eloquent  and  inspiring. 
His  methods  of  examination  furnished  the  very  best  of  mental  disci- 
pline, fitted  alike  to  cultivate  the  memory  and  strengthen  the  judg- 
ment. All  the  students  revered  him,  but  the  best  of  the  class  appreci- 
ated him  most.  His  counsels  were  faithful  and  judicious ;  his  admoni- 
tions paternal  and  discriminating,  his  rebukes  seldom  administered,  but 
scathingly  severe.  No  student  ever  left  his  presence  without  resolving 
to  do  better,  to  aim  higher,  and  to  win  his  approval. 

The  presence  of  such  a  man,  surrounded  and  supported  by 
able  instructors  in  various  departments  of  learning,  was  suf- 
ficient to  give  great  popularity  to  this  first  Canadian  college, 
and  quickened  the  spirit  of  the  whole  people  in  the  direction 
of  higher  learning,  until,  by  1843,  there  were  three  colleges 
in  active  operation  in  Ontario,  besides  McGill  in  Quebec. 
An  effort  was  made  at  this  early  date  to  combine  the  three 
colleges  of  the  western  province  in  a  provincial  university. 
The  Hon.  Mr.  Baldwin  introduced  a  bill  for  university  con- 
federation, but  the  defeat  of  the  ministry  prevented  its  becom- 
ing a  law.  The  attempt  was  renewed  in  1846,  with  no  bet- 
ter success,  and  when  a  university  bill  was  finally  passed,  in 
1849,  it  included  but  one  of  the  three  colleges.  The  effort 
was  renewed  in  1853,  but  the  new  bill  was  so  indefinite  in 
its  provisions  that  interested  parties  were  able  to  exclude  the 
Methodist  and  Presbyterian  colleges. 

Meantime  the  first  principal,  Dr.  Eyerson,  was  called  to 
the  chief  superintendency  of  education  for  the  province. 
His  place  was  filled  by  the  Rev.  Alexander  MclSTab,  D.D., 
under  whose  administration  the  college  held  a  good  position 
for  four  years,  numbering,  in  1848,  one  hundred  and  forty 


Victoria  Univeksitv.  271 

students.  During  this  period  Judge  Springer,  Rev.  Dr. 
Orniifiton,  Rev.  Professor  Wright,  Dr.  Cameron,  and  Mr. 
Cauipboll  were  graduated  in  arts. 

The  resignation  of  Dr.  McNah,  in  1849,  closed  the  fii-st 
period  of  the  history  of  Victoria  College,  in  which  the  insti- 
tution was  limited  to  purely  college  work,  that  is,  the  train- 
ing of  students  in  the  elements  of  a  general  and  liberal  edu- 
cation, leading  to  the  B.  A.  degree. 

Disturbing  influences  connected  with  the  resignation  of 
the  T)rincipal,  and  an  interregnum  of  a  year  and  a  half,  dis- 
persed the  students  and  seriously  interfered  with  the  future 
pi'ospects  of  the  college.  The  Methodists  were  anxious  to 
fall  in  with  the  popular  movement  for  a  national  university. 
Negotiations  were  commenced  with  that  in  view,  and  a  bill 
obtained  authorizing  the  removal  of  the  college  to  Toronto. 
The  government  of  the  day  did  not,  however,  prove  to  be 
suflieiently  earnest  in  purpose  to  carry  the  matter  to  comple- 
tion, and  the  only  result  was  the  abortive  affiliation  bill  of 
1853.  Meantime  the  leaders  of  Methodism  felt  that  the 
position  won  by  such  noble  and  self-sacrificing  efforts  in  the 
past  must  not  be  abandoned,  and  a  young  minister  just  or- 
dained, a  graduate  of  Wesleyan  University,  Middletown, 
and  one  of  the  first  under-graduates  of  Victoria  under  Dr. 
llyerson,  was  called  to  preside  over  the  destinies  of  the 
^[ethodist  college  in  September,  1850.  This  was  the  Rev. 
S.  S.  Nelles,  M.A.,  with  whose  name  the  history  of  Victoria, 
in  its  growth  toward  univei-sity  status,  is  most  intimately 
henceforward  associated.  The  young  principal  was  then  but 
twenty-seven  years  of  age ;  an  excellent  scholar,  mi  eloquent 
preacher,  and  a  most  successful  and  thorough  teacher,  but 
with  a  task  before  him  of  great  difficulty.  The  college 
treasury  was  empty.     There  was  absolutely  no  endowment. 


272  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

The  buildings  and  furniture,  after  fifteen  years  of  constant 
wear  by  hundreds  of  students,  were  sadly  in  need  of  repair 
and  renewal.  The  able  professors  of  other  days  had  betaken 
themselves  to  otlier  v/ork,  and  there  were  scarcely  thirty  stu- 
dents (but  two  matriculated)  to  respond  to  his  first  call  of 
college  opening.  To  raise  funds  for  an  endowment  sufficient 
to  bring  the  annual  income  of  the  college  up  to  $5,000, 
to  organize  an  efficient  staff  of  professors,  to  attract  and 
organize  students  once  more  into  the  relations  of  college 
life,  in  fact  to  resuscitate  the  college,  was  the  work  before 
him.  Meantime  the  Eevs.  John  Eyerson,  Dr.  E.  Eyerson, 
Eichard  Jones,  and  Dr.  Green,  J.  P.  Eoblin,  M.P.,  John 
Counter,  Esq.,  and  Eev.  William  Case,  of  the  original 
founders,  were  still  members  of  the  corporation,  and  af- 
forded counsel  and  support,  while  Dr.  Wood,  Dr.  Eice,  and 
Mr.  Musgrove,  wlio  represented  English  Methodism,  and 
three  old  students,  Messrs.  Sanderson,  Biggar,  and  Powell, 
were  added  to  the  corporation  and  lent  their  help  to  the  ef- 
fort. The  first  struggle  was  for  financial  relief.  Tliis  was  at- 
tempted in  September,  1851,  by  the  inauguration  of  what 
was  known  as  the  scholarship  scheme — an  effort  to  raise 
$50,000  by  the  sale  of  five  hundred  scholarships,  good  for 
free  tuition  in  this  college  for  twenty -five  years  from  date. 
At  the  following  Conference,  consisting  of,  all  told,  one  hun- 
dred and  fifty  ministers  and  preachers,  ninety  of  these  schol- 
arships were  sold  to  ministers,  and  between  three  and  four 
liundred  in  all  were  disposed  of,  realizing  about  $30,000  in 
principal,  but  depriving  the  institution  of  all  income  from 
fees  for  twenty-five  years  to  come.  But  if  not  a  grand  suc- 
cess in  raising  funds,  the  scholarships  were  a  means  of 
increasing  the  number  of  students.  Meantime  the  board 
were  successful  in  bringing  to  the  support  of  tlie  principal 


YlCTOKIA    U^lVEliSlTY.  273 

three  very  able  members  of  the  former  staff :  Professor 
Kingston,  in  mathematics ;  Professor  John  Wilson,  in  clas- 
sics; and  Professor  John  Beattj,  M.D.,  in  natural  science. 
These  men  were  as  varied  in  gifts  and  scholarship  as  the 
departments  over  which  they  presided.  Professor  Kingston 
was  an  embodiment  of  the  exactness  of  mathematical  science, 
and  no  student  could  pass  through  his  liands  without  learn- 
ing to  deiine  and  demonstrate.  Professor  Wilson,  of  Trinity 
College,  Dublin,  was  famed  for  the  unfailing  accuracy  and 
extent  of  his  scholarship,  for  his  line  literary  taste,  and  for 
the  beautiful  Christian  perfection  of  his  character,  which  was 
a  constant  living  lesson  to  all  the  boys.  Dr.  Beatty  was  a 
scientist,  a  politician,  a  man  of  the  world,  and  a  leader  in  the 
Church,  one  of  those  clear,  active,  versatile,  and  strong 
minds  that  young  men  delight  to  follow.  When  at  the  head 
of  all  these  was  placed  the  learning,  the  philosophical  acu- 
men, tlie  brilliant  eloquence,  and  the  administrative  ability 
of  the  president,  Victoria  found  a  staff  which,  for  the  pur- 
poses of  college  discipline,  could  not  easily  be  excelled. 
Meantime,  under  their  hands,  the  gathered  masses  of  raw 
material  soon  began  to  organize  into  a  well-defined  college 
life.  The  number  of  students  rose  to  nearly  three  hundred, 
and  the  regular  under-graduate  classes,  which  had  all  disap- 
l)eared  save  one  during  the  intei'regnum,  were  again  filled 
out.  At  this  formative  period,  when  the  traditions  which  so 
])owerfully  regulate  student-life  were  being  established,  it 
w;\s  the  blessed  fortune  of  the  college  to  be  visited  with  a 
j^'reat  revival.  An  old  student,  Kev.  G.  R.  Sanderson,  was 
pastor.  About  a  dozen  faithful,  godly  young  men,  the 
l^o^;t  of  whom  are  prominent  leaders  in  the  Churcli  to-day 
(four  have  been  Conference  presidents),  formed  a  band  for 

prayer  and  work  among  their  fellow-students.     When  the 
12* 


27tt  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

work  began,  not  twenty-five  per  cent,  of  the  students  were 
professing  Christians.  At  the  end  not  five  per  cent,  were 
left  unmoved  by  the  power  of  saving  grace.  Out  of  the 
fruits  of  that  revival  came  a  score  of  ministers,  a  number  of 
Conference  presidents,  one  of  our  general  superintendents, 
and  a  large  number  of  the  leading  Christian  laymen  of  our 
Church  to-day.  But,  better  even  than  that,  the  ablest,  old- 
est, and  most  advanced  students  all  converted,  a  high  moral 
and  religious  tone  became  an  established  tradition  of  the 
college,  continuously  maintained  through  the  thirty  classes 
that  have  graduated  out  of  college  to  this  day.  There  has 
been  very  little  serious  difiiculty  about  the  discipline  of  the 
institution  from  that  day  to  this.  It  was  about  this  time 
that  Kev.  Dr.  Rice  became  associated  with  the  institution  as 
moral  governor  and  chaplain,  and  by  the  great  force  of  his 
religious  character  did  much  to  establish  and  perfect  the 
religious  life  commenced  in  the  great  revival. 

The  period  had  now  arrived  for  the  expansion  of  the  col- 
lege life  and  work  into  that  of  the  university.  In  the  his- 
tory of  American  colleges  this  process  has  been  accom- 
plished in  various  w^ays.  According  to  the  earliest  method, 
the  institution  became  a  university  without  ceasing  to  be  a 
college.  The  compactly  organized  arts  faculty,  with  its  four 
under-graduate  classes  engaged  in  the  work  of  a  common  lib- 
eral discipline  and  foundation  of  intellectual  culture,  contin- 
ued to  be  the  center.  To  this  were  added  other  faculties  of 
divinity,  law,  medicine,  engineering,  and  more  recently 
science  and  philosophy,  affording  opportunity  for  post-gradu- 
ate study  and  special  attainments,  according  to  individual 
preferences  and  requirements.  The  German  universities 
liave  been  the  models  of  this  development,  although  tliey 
have  long  since  relegated  the  foundation  work  to  tlie  gymna- 


VicTOEiA  University.  275 

sium,  and  confined  tlie  university  to  what  with  ns  would  be 
post-graduate  work.  In  this  way  they  have  escaped  some  of 
the  great  difficulties  which  have  affected  our  work  in  the 
New  World.  Foremost  of  these  is  the  difficulty  of  reaching 
the  most  perfect  culture  and  discipline  with  too  great  a 
number  of  students.  Much  depends  upon  the  ability  of  the 
president  as  an  administrator,  organizer,  and  educator.  But 
our  very  ablest  presidents  find  five  hundred  students  too 
many,  and  most  can  effect  the  best  results  with  less  than  two 
hundred.  The  German  university  has  only  to  deal  with 
trained  students — men  whose  general  intellectual  discipline 
and  culture  is  already  established. 

A  second  line  of  university  development,  in  which  the 
London  University  has  taken  the  lead,  has  been  on  the  prin- 
ciple of  optional  courses.  Proceeding  on  the  principle  that 
intellectual  culture  and  discipline  may  be  attained  by  the 
pursuit  of  almost  any  branch  or  branches  of  science,  it  com- 
bines and  fuses  college  and  university,  builds  a  school  of  all 
sciences  and  all  learning,  and  expects  the  raw  students  to 
attain  college  discipline  and  intellectual  culture  from  such  a 
selection  of  studies  as  their  individual  abilities,  tastes,  or  pur- 
poses for  future  life  may  lead  them  to  prefer,  lliis  theory 
has,  perhaps,  not  affected  the  colleges  of  the  United  States  as 
much  as  the  Canadian.  Its  great  danger  is,  of  course,  one- 
sided development.  Lastly,  we  have  now,  beginning  in 
America,  the  effort  to  distinguish  the  work  of  the  univer- 
sity from  that  of  the  college,  and  to  assign  them  to  entirely 
separate  departments,  as  in  the  Johns  Hopkins  University. 

The  university  development  of  Victoria  College  was  at 
first  along  the  old-fashioned  line,  and  fortunately  in  such  a 
way  as  not  to  interfere  with  college  work.  A  faculty  of 
medicine  was  established  in  1S54,  but  in  the  city  of  Toronto, 


io 


Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 


and  witli  an  entirely  independent  teaching  staff  and  financial 
management.  A  similar  faculty  of  law  was  added  in  1860, 
and  a  faculty  of  theology  in  closer  relations  to  the  college  in 
1871.  During  all  this  time  the  faculty  of  arts  adhered  faith- 
fully to  the  old  college  discipline  of  classics,  mathematics, 
and  philosophy,  wuth  a  moderate  addition  of  modern  litera- 
ture and  science.  The  number  of  under-graduates  in  arts  at 
no  time  exceeded  one  hundred  and  fifty,  and  no  Canadian 
college  did  more  thorough  work  along  this  line  than  Yicto- 
ria.  Her  university  work  in  distinct  lines  gave  her  the 
advantage  of  moral  influence  and  support  in  the  country,  as 
her  graduates  in  medicine  alone  now  number  over  a  thousand. 
Victoria  has,  however,  shared  with  all  other  American  insti- 
tutions the  influence  of  modern  ideas,  and  has  felt  the  press- 
ure of  the  claims  of  modern  science.  As  early  as  1856  the 
introduction  of  Dr.  Whitlock,  formerly  of  Genesee  Wesleyan 
Seminary  and  College,  into  the  staff  in  the  department  of 
natural  philosophy  gave  an  impulse  in  that  direction.  He 
was  a  man  of  rare  genius — a  philosopher  rather  than  a  pro- 
fessor, who  thought  aloud  before  his  class,  and  suffered  them 
to  imbibe  the  fire  of  his  own  spirit.  He  was  followed,  in 
1864,  by  Dr.  Harris,  now  of  Amherst  College,  a  man  who  had 
tlien  just  graduated  from  a  German  university,  and  who 
molded  students  with  a  strong  hand,  leaving  on  all  his  men 
a  very  decided  impress  of  the  culture  of  physical  and  chem- 
ical science.  Meantime  other  changes  favored  this  incipient 
tendency.  Professor  Bain  succeeded  Professor  Kingston  in 
tlie  chair  of  mathematics,  bringing  from  Europe  the  modern 
taste  for  the  employment  of  mathematics  as  tlie  instrument 
of  scientific  investigation.  A  chair  of  English  literature 
was  established  in  the  hands  of  Professor  Reynar,  and  a  new 
impulse  given  to  that  department,  as  well  as  to  modern  liter- 


YiCTORiA  Univeksity.  277 

ature  generally.  Finally,  in  1873,  Dr.  Haanel  took  charge 
of  the  department  of  science.  Bringing  with  him  the  most 
accurate  scholarsliip,  and  employing  it  with  an  ability  and 
enthusiasm  rarely  equaled,  what  was  a  chair,  under  his  hand 
soon  expanded  into  a  department,  presenting  a  complete 
curriculum  in  science,  embracing  varied  work  in  mathemat- 
ics and  modern  literature,  and  rendering  necessary  the  chair 
in  natural  history  and  geology,  now  filled  by  Dr.  Coleman, 
and  the  erection  of  Faraday  Hall  for  the  science  depart- 
ment. While  maintaining  its  conservative  character,  and 
adhering  more  closely  than  most  to  the  old  fixed  curriculum, 
Victoria  University  has  thus  carefully  adapted  itself  to 
modern  requirements,  and  to-day  offei*s  a  varied  field  of  uni- 
versity options  in  the  college  course,  with  some  facility  for 
post  graduate  work  in  both  science  and  theology,  of  which  a 
number  of  her  graduates  have  already  availed  themselves. 

These  steps  in  advance  were  not  taken  without  involving 
considerable  financial  embarrassment.  In  1860  an  effort  was 
made  to  claim  the  relations  to  the  provincial  university  sys- 
tem, to  which  the  early  history  of  Victoria  University  fully 
entitled  her.  But  the  effort,  while  resulting  in  good  to  the 
university  work  of  the  country  at  large,  brought  Victoria 
merely  a  slightly  increased  subsidy  from  the  public  funds. 
A  considerable  debt  had  accumulated  during  the  ten  years  of 
struggle  in  which  Dr.  Xelles  and  his  staff  had  been  enira"^ed 
to  secure  a  position  as  a  university,  and  which  was  wiped  out 
by  the  energetic  efforts  of  the  lie  v.  Dr.  Aylesworth  between 
the  years  1802  and  1805,  and  the  college  placed  in  a  position 
to  make  income  equal  to  expenditure.  Scarcely,  however,  was 
this  effected,  when,  in  18G8,  a  combination  of  adverse  forces 
in  Parliament  depi-ivcd  both  Victoria  University  and  Queen's 
College  of  the  annual  grants  which  for  twenty-seven  yeara 


2TS  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

tliey  had  received  from  the  government ;  and  financial  ruin 
once  more  stared  om-  college  in  the  face.  At  this  juncture 
the  late  Dr.  Punshon  became  associated  with  Canadian 
Methodism.  He  at  once  threw  his  influence  into  the  effort 
made  by  President  Nelles  for  the  college  endowment.  The 
Conference  seconded  and  supported  the  work,  its  mem- 
bers for  several  years  taxing  their  salaries  to  meet  the  annual 
deficit.  In  a  few  years  an  endowment  of  $100,000  was 
raised,  more  than  replacing  the  grant  so  unceremoniously 
withdrawn.  At  the  same  time  the  growing  necessities  of 
the  university  began  to  attract  the  attention  of  broad- 
minded,  generous,  and  wealthy  men.  The  late  Edward 
Jackson  led  the  way  in  this  work.  The  theological  depart- 
ment was  projected  under  his  patronage,  he  and  his  equally 
generous  and  devoted  wife  contributing,  by  gift  and  bequest, 
$30,000  for  this  purpose,  resulting  in  the  appointment  of  the 
writer  as  dean  of  the  faculty  of  theology  and  professor  of 
biblical  and  systematic  theology.  A  few  years  later  another 
gentleman,  a  partner  and  life  long  friend  of  Mr.  Jackson, 
Dennis  Moore,  Esq.,  contributed  $25,000  to  assi-t  in  the  ex- 
tension of  the  department  of  science.  The  death  of  Dr. 
Pyerson  was  the  occasion  of  a  worthy  memorial  effort,  now 
nearly  completed,  to  endow  the  chair  of  moral  philosophy, 
which  he  had  filled  during  his  presidency,  with  the  sum  of 
$35,000.  The  late  Sheriff  Patrick  has  also  left  a  bequest  of 
some  $20,000,  so  that  at  the  present  time  the  assets  of  the 
college  are  about  $250,000,  and  the  annual  income  about 
$20,000. 

The  last  event  in  the  history  of  Victoria  University  is  a 
result  of  Methodist  Union.  In  1857  the  Methodist  Episco- 
pal Church  in  Canada  established  the  Belleville  Seminary, 
which,  in  1857,  was  enlarged  to  Albert  College,  and  in  1871 


YlCTORIA   UxiVEIiSITY.  279 

endowed  with  a  charter  conferring  full  university  powers. 
In  18S4,  the  year  of  the  consummation  of  the  Methodist 
Union,  the  number  of  graduates  in  the  various  faculties  had 
reached  a  hundred,  and  the  institution  was  doing  excellent 
college  work  in  the  bachelor  of  arts  curriculum.  This  work, 
with  a  member  of  the  staff,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Badglej,  and  the 
university  functions,  were  transferred  to  Victoria  University, 
strengthening  its  influence,  and  centering  the  entire  interest 
of  the  new  Church  in  Ontario  and  Quebec  in  the  one  uni- 
versity. 

In  summing  up  the  work  of  fifty  years,  thirty-five  under 
the  presidency  of  Dr.  Nelles,  we  find  that  in  our  institution 
nearly  five  thousand  students  have  been  educated,  eighteen 
hundred  of  whom  have  graduated  in  arts,  medicine,  law, 
divinity,  or  science,  many  of  these  taking  degrees  in  two  or 
more  faculties.  The  present  staff  numbers  nine  professors  in 
arts,  five  in  theology,  two  strong  faculties  in  medicine,  one 
in  Toronto  and  the  other  in  Montreal,  and  an  able  board  of 
examiners  in  law.  The  roll  of  students  last  year  numbered 
four  hundred  and  forty-nine,  and  the  graduates  in  all  the  fac- 
ulties one  hundred  and  six,  including  five  honorary  degrees. 

Our  limited  space  prevents  more  than  reference  to  the 
growth  of  college  societies,  periodicals,  and  other  accompani- 
ments of  a  vigorous  college  life.  The  college  never  Wiis 
more  thoroughly  efficient  in  all  its  departments,  and  its 
steady  growth  promises  for  it  a  future  of  assured  success  and 
blessing  to  the  country. 


280  Eaely  Schools  of  Metuodism. 


CHAPTER  XY. 

GOUVERNEUR  WESLEYAN  SEMINARY. 

BY  A.   W.    CUMMINGS,    D.D.,  LL.D. 

The  Black  Eiver  (now  Northern  New  York)  Conference 
was  formed  from  the  Oneida  in  1836.  Its  first  care  was  to 
provide  a  seminary  of  learning  for  its  youth.  To  a  conven- 
tion of  the  Potsdam  District,  called  in  the  spring  of  1837  by 
its  presiding  elder,  He  v.  John  Loveys,  Rev.  Reuben  Rey- 
nolds, in  charge  of  the  Gouverneur  Circuit,  reported,  that 
from  various  interviews  with  leading  citizens  of  Gouverneur, 
and  with  trustees  of  the  institution,  he  thought  that  the  high 
school  there  could,  on  favorable  terms,  be  secured  to  tlie 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  It  was  well  located  on  the 
park,  in  the  center  of  the  village,  had  a  good  brick  building — 
a  center  with  two  wings — all  two  stories  high.  Tlie  proposi- 
tion to  receive  this  school,  if  tendered,  was  favored  by  the 
convention.  The  people  of  Gouverneur  were  refined,  moral, 
and  cultivated.  There  were  no  Methodists  in  the  village, 
but  they  were  numerous  in  the  country  around.  The  ten- 
der of  the  school  in  due  time  was  made  to  a  committee 
empowered  to  act  for  the  Church  within  the  Potsdam  Dis- 
trict. The  contract  was  soon  closed,  and  the  school  became 
the  property  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  The 
preachers  of  the  district  made  an  active  canvass  for  students, 
that  an  impressive  opening  might  be  made. 

Rev.  Jesse  T.  Peck,  then  in  the  fifth  year  of  his  ministry, 
was  made  the  principal  of  the  school,  wliicli,  by  a  subsequent 
act  of  the  Legislature,  became  Gouverneur  Wesley  an  Semi- 


GouvERNEUR  Wesleyan  Seminary.  281 

nary.  Mr.  Peck  was  chosen  because  of  his  known  energy 
and  ability,  and  especially  as  it  was  thought  that  he,  more 
easily  tlian  any  other  available  person,  could  meet  the  antici- 
pated opposition  from  friends  of  the  Cazenovia  Seminary  in 
the  Conference.  Dr.  George  Peck  was  then  the  principal  at 
Cazenovia.  Eev.  Stephen  Allen,  A.B.,  (now  Dr.  Allen,  of 
the  Maine  Conference)  and  Miss  Adelaide  Sturtevant  were 
the  other  teachers.  The  school  opened  in  August,  1837, 
with  a  large  attendance  of  students,  male  and  female.  To 
the  Conference,  that  met  a  little  later  in  the  month,  at  Pots- 
dam, a  most  cheering  report  was  made  of  the  successful 
opening.  Not  without  some  doubt  as  to  the  wisdom  of 
establishing  a  Conference  seminary  at  a  point  so  remote  from 
the  center,  the  Conference  took  the  school  under  its  official 
patronage.  Before  the  first  term  closed  the  attendance  of 
students  was  so  large  that  another  teacher  was  required. 
A.  W.  Cummings,  who  at  the  Conference  in  August  had 
been  received  on  trial  and  appointed  pastor  of  the  Meth- 
odist Episcopal  Church  at  Martinsburg,  the  county  seat 
of  Lewis,  and  who  was  expected  to  continue  his  services 
as  the  principal  of  the  Collinsville  Institute  in  the  same 
county,  was  chosen  teacher  of  mathematics  in  the  new 
seminary.  Upon  the  recommendation  of  his  presiding  el- 
der, Eev.  George  Gary,  Mr.  Cummings  was  released  from 
his  pastoral  work  by  Bishop  Hedding,  and  appointed  to  the 
seminary. 

The  opening  of  this  school  constituted  an  era  in  Northern 
New  York  Methodism.  Having  a  Methodist  school  at  their 
doors,  many  families,  who  would  scarcely  have  thought  of 
sending  their  children  a  hundred  miles  to  Cazenovia,  and 
probably  would  not  have  sent  them  to  a  school  of  one  of  the 
rival  Churches,  sent  them  to  Gouverneur.     During  the  first 


282  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

term  more  than  one  hundred  pupils  were  enrolled  in  the 
various  classes. 

The  spirit  of  revival  came  upon  the  seminary.  Many  of 
the  students  were  truly  pious  when  they  entered ;  most  of 
those  not  so  were  during  that  revival  brought  to  the 
(Saviour.  The  writer  spent  seven  years  in  that  school. 
Nearly  fifty  years  have  passed  since  his  entrance  there,  but 
the  events  of  that  revival  winter  were  so  daguerreotyped 
upon  his  heart  that  time  will  never  efface  them.  The 
school  was  full,  but  there  was  no  diminution,  as  some  feared 
there  would  be,  in  the  attendance  at  the  noble  Cazenovia 
Seminary.  The  educational  work  at  Gouverneur  was  nearly 
a  clear  gain.  Before  the  days  of  railroads  students  rarely 
went  over  fifty  miles  from  home  to  school.  A  circle  with  a 
radius  of  fifty  miles  encircled  the  homes  of  most  pupils  in 
any  of  the  schools. .  Hence  the  wisdom  of  the  prudent  mul- 
tiplication of  Methodist  schools.  How  wonderful  was  the 
influence  of  our  early  schools  at  Cazenovia,  Wilbraham, 
Kent's  Hill,  Lima,  and  Amenia  upon  the  Church  and  minis- 
try of  Methodism  !  "When  in  1818  Wilbur  Fisk  entered  the 
Methodist  ministry  the  Church  had  not  a  half-dozen  regular 
graduates  in  its  ministry.  Now  what  an  army  of  scholars ! 
The  first  year  of  the  seminary  closed  with  two  hundred  and 
fifty-two  students  enrolled.  During  the  next  year  Mr.  Allen 
retired  from  the  faculty,  and  Erastus  Wentworth,  A.B.,  while 
principal  of  the  Lowville  Academy,  in  Lewis  County,  N.  Y., 
was  chosen  to  fill  his  place.  Miss  Sturtevant  also  retired, 
and  was  succeeded  by  Miss  Lydia  Fisk.  The  last  hours  of 
the  year  1838  were  spent  by  the  teachers  and  students  at  the 
seminary  chapel  in  the  services  of  a  watch-night.  It  was 
the  last  time  the  chapel  was  used.  From  the  opening  of  the 
seminary  under    Methodist  auspices,  it    had  been  occupied 


GouvEKNEUR  Wesleyan  Seminary.  283 

for  all  reliorioiis  services  of  the  school  and  church  in  Gon- 
verneiir.  It  was  a  large  well-arranged  audience  room  in  the 
center  of  the  main  building. 

On  the  evening  of  January  1,  1839,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Peck, 
Professor  Wentworth,  and  the  lady  teachers  were  spending 
a  social  evening,  by  invitation,  at  the  home  of  Mr.  Cum- 
mings.  At  about  11  o'clock  P.M.,  while  at  the  supper  ta- 
ble, an  alarm  of  lire  was  heard.  Rushing  to  the  window 
that  opened  toward  the  seminary,  but  a  few  yards  away, 
flames  were  seen  bursting  from  the  windows  of  a  student's 
room  in  the  west  -wing  of  the  building.  The  rapid  ringing 
of  the  school-bell  soon'  brought  to  the  scene  of  disaster 
most  of  the  male  citizens  of  the  village.  The  night  was 
intensely  cold,  and,  with  no  appliances  for  extinguishing  the 
fire,  the  teachers,  students,  and  village  people  present  could 
only  fold  their  arms,  and  calmly  await  the  complete  demo- 
lition of  the  edifice  around  which  so  many  hopes  clustered. 
While  all  in  silence  were  thinking.  What  next  ?  in  thrilling 
tones  Mr.  Peck  announced  the  school  would  be  resumed  at 
the  close  of  the  holidays  and  be  continued  as  usual.  To  all 
this  was  a  most  cheering  announcement,  and  each  probably 
thought.  How  and  where  ?  There  was  a  general  desire  for 
the  continuance  of  the  school  at  Gouverneur.  The  citizens 
made  liberal  personal  subscriptions,  and  at  a  called  town  meet- 
ing voted  to  raise  $2,000  to  aid  in  rebuilding.  Mr.  Peck  at 
once  visited  Ogdenslnirg  and  other  towns  in  St.  Lawrence 
and  Jefferson  Counties  soliciting  aid  to  rebuild.  The  re- 
sponse, for  those  early  days  of  poverty,  was  most  generous. 

In  Ogdensburg  resided  two  very  worthy  and  somewhat 
wealthy  gentlemen,  both,  at  the  time,  candidates  for  nomina- 
tion, by  a  convention  soon  to  assemble,  to  seats  in  Congress. 
Mr.  Peck  first  called  upon  the  Hon.  Judge  Fine,  reputed  to 


284:  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

be  a  liberal  and  noble  Christian  gentleman.  He  surprised 
Mr.  Peck  with  a  cheerful  subscription  of  $200.  He  next 
visited  the  rival  for  Congressional  honors,  the  Hon.  Henry 
Yan  Rensselaer,  who,  without  a  moment's  hesitation,  wrote 
his  name  for  $400.  Others  in  Ogdensburg  gave  smaller, 
yet  liberal,  sums,  amounting  to  over  $1,100.  Other  places 
gave  generous  encouragement.  Thus  assured,  the  trustees 
determined  to  proceed  in  the  preparation  to  erect  a  new 
building.  Mr.  Cummings  was  excused  from  school  duties, 
and  detailed  to  secure  the  material,  that  the  construction 
might  begin  as  soon  as  the  weather  of  spring  would  permit. 
As  his  duties  would  require  the  service  of  a  horse  and 
sleigh  in  winter,  and  a  bugg}^  in  summer,  his  salary  was 
raised  to  $400  per  annum.  This  was  more  than  would 
have  been  his  Disciplinary  allowance  in  pastoral  work. 
Time  was  too  precious,  and  the  necessities  of  the  case  too 
urgent,  to  allow  of  the  delay  of  making  brick  in  the  spring. 
The  students  then  in  school  would  submit  to  the  inconven- 
ience of  the  extemporized  school-rooms  to  the  end  of  the 
school  year,  but  they  would  not  return  for  the  next  year 
unless  better  accommodations  were  provided.  Euilding 
could  not,  in  that  boreal  climate,  begin  earlier  than  May. 
The  building  must  be  ready  for  occupancy  by  September  1. 
Brick  could  not  be  made  in  time  for  tins.  A  frame  build- 
ing was  not  thought  of ;  a  stone  edifice  was  determined 
upon.  A  large  mass  of  red  sandstone  was  known  to  exist 
about  five  miles  distant,  in  a  forest  of  heavy  timber..  This 
quarry  had  never  been  opened.  On  the  first  day  of  Febru- 
ary, 1839,  before  it  was  fairly  light,  Mr.  Cummings  was 
moving  in  his  sleigh  toward  the  stone  quarry.  On  his  way 
he  secured  the  company  and  aid  of  all  the  men  he  could  in 
opening  the  new  quarry.     The  stone  was  found  in  a  lodge 


GouvEKNEUR  Wesleyan  Seminary.  285 

varying  from  twenty  to  forty  feet  high,  surmounted  by 
banks  of  snow  and  earth  four  or  five  feet  deep.  Snow 
upon  the  level  was  from  three  to  four  feet  deep.  A  point 
of  easy  approach  with  teams  was  selected,  and  two  or  three 
rods  square  denuded  of  snow  and  ice.  Protected  by  an  early 
snow,  the  ground  was  not  very  deeply  frozen.  Stone  was 
found  in  abundance,  of  good  quality.  The  work  of  the  day 
was  experimental,  and  considerably  shook  the  faith  of  some, 
who  had  very  confidently  affirmed  that  stone,  in  that  climate, 
could  not  be  quarried  in  winter  without  great  expense.  The 
work  went  on  until  a  few  cords  of  stone  were  ready  for  the 
teams.  A  favorable  contract  was  then  made  for  the  delivery 
on  the  building  lot  of  the  stone  required  to  erect  a  seminary 
edifice  three  stories  high,  sixty-four  by  forty-four  feet  on  the 
ground. 

The  securing  of  the  stone  on  reasonable  terms  was  re- 
garded as  a  favorable  start  in  the  rebuilding.  A  contract  was 
closed  for  the  construction  of  the  walls,  plastering  and  other 
work,  including  the  material.  All  parts  of  the  edifice  being 
])rovided  for,  Mr.  Cummings  gave  his  attention  to  increas- 
ing the  subscriptions  so  encouragingly  opened  by  Mr.  Peck. 
For  those  days,  and  the  circumstances  of  the  country,  the 
response  to  the  call  for  help  was  liberal  and  generous.  There 
were  then  no  railroads  in  that  region.  The  surplus  of  the 
farm  must  be  conveyed  a  long  distance  on  a  sleigh  in  winter, 
or  wagon  in  summer,  to  market,  and  then  sold  at  a  low 
price.  The  people  handled  but  little  money.  When  the 
school  year  closed,  in  July,  the  new  edifice  was  in  such  a 
stage  of  progress  that  all  felt  that  it  would  be  ready  for  the 
opening  in  September.  Tlie  new  building,  very  commodious, 
and  adapted  to  the  wants  of  a  large  school,  having  in  it  no 
dormitories,  was  dedic.;ted  before  the  new  school  year  began. 


28G  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

The  term  opened  prosperously,  with  the  same  teachers,  ex- 
cept that  Miss  Frances  A.  Wentworth  took  the  position  at 
the  head  of  the  female  department,  vacated  by  Miss  Fisk. 
Before  the  year  closed  Mr.  Peck  accepted  the  charge  of  the 
Troy  Conference  Academy,  at  West  Poultney,  Vermont. 
His  removal  was  generally  regretted  by  the  friends  of  the 
Gouverneur  Seminary.  Without  superior  educational  ad- 
vantages or  attainments,  by  hard  study  and  untiring  devo- 
tion to  any  work  assigned  him  by  the  Church,  he  always 
achieved  at  least  average  success.  Mr.  Wentworth,  within  a 
few  months,  joined  Mr.  Peck  in  his  new  Held  of  labor. 
Eev.  L.  L.  Knox,  A.M.,  succeeded  Mr.  Peck  as  principal, 
and  Kev.  Edward  Bannister,  A.M.,  took  the  position  of  Mr. 
Wentworth  in  the  school.  These  were  both  alwinni  of  the 
Wesleyan  University,  of  fine  scholarship,  and  in  all  other 
respects  well  adapted  to  the  offices  tliey  filled.  At  the  open- 
ing of  the  school  year  for  1841  Miss  Ann  E.  Bowen,  daughter 
of  the  late  distinguished  Dr.  Elias  Bowen,  became  precep- 
tress. Miss  Bowen,  at  the  end  of  the  winter  term,  became 
the  wife  of  Mr.  Knox,  and  they  both  witlidrew  from  the 
school  at  the  close  of  the  year  1842. 

Mr.  Knox  was  transferred  to  the  Oneida  Conference,  and 
rendered  good  service  in  pastoral  work  for  several  years.  He 
was  for  a  time  principal  of  tlie  East  Maine  Conference  Sem- 
inary, then  served  for  some  years  as  professor  in  Lawrence 
University,  Wisconsin.  The  school  year  for  1842  opened 
with  Kev.  A.  W.  Cummings,  A.M.,  as  principal ;  E-ev.  Edward 
Bannister,  A.M.,  teacher  of  languages  and  natural  science ; 
Mr.  H.  D.  Laudy,  A.M.,  French  and  drawing ;  Mrs.  Laudy, 
teacher  of  music  and  painting ;  and  Miss  Elizabeth  Manner- 
ing  was  the  preceptress.  She  was  a  highly  accomplished 
Christian  lady,  and  filled  her  poi^ition  mobt   satisfactorily. 


GouvERNEUB  Wesleyan  Seminaey.  287 

At  the  close  of  the  winter  term  the  public  exercises  of  the 
iisiiul  exhibition  were  concluded  by  the  performance  of  the 
marriage  ceremony  by  the  principal,  and  Mr.  Bannister  and 
^liss  Mannering  became  husband  and  wife.  They  traveled 
life's  journey  together  for  about  thirty  years,  he  first  reach- 
ing the  end.  Dr.  Bannister  was  a  man  of  estimable  charac- 
ter, and  died  in  California,  while  president  of  the  University 
of  the  Pacific.  A  similar  service  closed  the  public  exer- 
cises of  a  year  previous.  Mr.  Knox  and  Miss  Bowen  were 
then  the  parties,  and  Mr.  Cummings  the  celebrant.  This 
school  year  closed  prosperously.  The  attendance  of  students 
was  very  large,  and  the  revival  that  had  distinguished  each 
winter  was  enjoyed  during  the  winter  of  184:2-'43.  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Bannister  retired  at  the  close,  and  he  became  pastor 
of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  at  Ogdensburg. 

The  school  year  of  1843  opened  with  a  large  attendance 
of  students,  indeed  as  full  as  was  desirable.  The  faculty 
consisted  of  Rev.  A.  W.  Cummings,  A.M.,  principal,  men- 
tal and  moral  sciences;  Sanford  Halbert,  A.M.,  mathemat- 
ics; Caleb  S.  Sanford,  A.M.,  ancient  languages;  Hyacinthe 
D.  Laudy,  A.M.,  French  and  drawing;  Mrs.  H.  D.  Laudy, 
nmsic,  piano ;  Miss  Charity  A.  Ingerson,  preceptress ;  Miss 
Ann  E.  Horr,  primary  class. 

The  preceding  year  was  filled  with  afilictions  to  the  prin- 
cipal. The  first  great  sorrow  of  his  life  was  the  death  of  a 
little  son,  an  only  child,  of  great  promise,  not  quite  four 
years  of  age.  Next  came  the  death  of  his  pious  mother,  fol- 
lowed by  the  death  of  his  wife,  who  had  been  the  compan- 
ion of  his  school- boy  days,  his  youthful  associate  in  the  Sab- 
bath-school and  in  the  church,  and  who  for  six  years,  as  his 
l>ctrothed,  had  patiently  waited  the  arrival  of  full  manhood 
and    the   consummation   of   his  plans  of  education  for  the 


Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

fruition  of  tlieir  liopes.  Forty  years  of  busy  life,  in  various 
portions  of  America,  aud  in  various  fields  of  active  employ- 
ments, have  never  fully  dispelled  tlie  clouds  that  then  over- 
shadowed him.  His  first  marriage  was  purely  an  impulse  of 
the  heart.  In  his  subsequent  the  affections  were  more 
tander  the  control  of  judgment.  In  both,  safe  results  were 
attained. 

The  school  year  of  184:4-'45  opened  in  September  with  the 
same  teachers  as  the  former  year,  except  that  Principal  Cum- 
mings  entered  upon  pastoral  w^ork  in  the  Black  River  Con. 
ference,  and  Rev.  John  W.  Armstrong  took  his  place  in  the 
seminary.  Mr.  Armstrong  held  the  principalship  for  five 
years ;  he  then  spent  a  few  years  in  pastoral  work,  afterward 
taught  in  several  schools,  and  died  while  principal  of  the  nor- 
mal school  at  Fredonia,  N.  Y.,  in  1878,  at  the  age  of  sixty- 
five  years.  Dr.  Armstrong  was  succeeded  by  Prof.  William 
W.  Clark,  a  graduate  from  the  "Wesleyan  University  in  the 
class  of  1848,  who  had  rendered  two  years  of  good  service 
in  tlie  seminary  as  professor  of  mathematics.  He  was  prin- 
cipal three  years,  and  at  the  same  time  filled  the  chair  of 
ancient  languages.  In  1853  he  accepted  a  professorship  in 
the  Genesee  Wesleyan  Seminary,  where  he  continued  about 
ten  years,  including  one  in  Genesee  College.  He  resigned 
his  professorship  in  bad  health,  and  died  in  Rochester,  N.  Y., 
in  1869. 

Rev.  Eli  C.  Bruce,  A.M.,  a  graduate  of  the  Wesleyan 
University,  became  principal  of  the  seminary  in  1853,  as  the 
successor  to  Prof.  William  W.  Clark.  Mr.  Bruce  had  had 
several  years  experience  in  the  ministry  as  a  member  of  the 
Black  River  Conference,  including  two  years  that  he  served 
as  principal  of  the  Red  Creek  Union  Academy,  N.  Y.  He 
took  high  position  at  once  as  a  good  scholar,  discreet  mana- 


GouvERNEUE  Wesleyan  Seminaky.  289 

ger  of  students,  and  as  a  successful  teacher.  His  associates 
in  the  work  of  instruction  were  Professors  Samuel  D.  Barr 
for  three  years,  teaching  mathematics  and  natural  science ; 
then,  in  the  same  branches.  Professor  Charles  W.  McCarty, 
Hev.  Andrew  Eoe,  three  years.  A  part  of  this  time  Albert 
E.  Corse  taught  the  common  and  higher  English  branches. 

During  the  first  year  of  Professor  Bruce's  principalship 
Miss  Cordelia  M.  Ingerson,  who  in  1839  entered  the  seminary 
as  a  student,  with  a  brother  and  three  sisters,  filled  with  abil- 
ity the  oftice  of  preceptress.  Miss  Angeline  Munson  fol- 
lowed her  for  two  years,  then  Miss  Louise  Payne  for  one 
year.  The  next  two  years  Miss  Julia  Runyon  filled  the 
olfice,  and  was  succeeded  during  the  last  of  Mr.  Bruce's  seven 
years  as  principal,  by  Miss  Julia  A.  Wilson.  Miss  Malona 
M.  Smith  taught  writing,  drawing,  painting,  and  book-keep- 
ing. Rev.  Andrew  Roe,  A.M.,  was  graduated  from  the  Wes- 
leyan University  in  the  class  of  1837.  At  the  opening  of 
tlie  fall  term  of  that  year  he  entered  the  seminary  as  the  pro- 
fessor of  mathematics  and  natural  science.  In  1858  Miss 
Julia  A.  Wilson  became  preceptress,  and  Mrs.  Professor  Roe 
teacher  of  English  literature,  and  assistant  in  Latin.  In 
1800  Dr.  Bruce  entered  again  the  pastorate,  and  Professor 
Roe  was  called  to  the  principalship.  Rev.  Melville  D.  Kin- 
ney, A.B.,  Rev.  Otis  S.Graves,  and  Miss  Susan  S.  Thomas, 
at  the  same  date,  became  teachers.  The  fall  term  under  the 
new  administration  opened  very  prosperously  with  a  large 
number  of  students.  A  new  and  complete  graduating  course 
was  instituted  for  such  as  would  not  enter  college.  In  this 
course  Miss  Lucy  A.  Yan  Duzee  has  the  honor  of  being  the 
first  graduate.  During  Mr.  Roe's  first  year  as  principal 
three  hundred   and  ten  students  were  enrolled.     The  next 

summer  extensive  repairs   were   made   upiai  the  old  stone 
13 


290  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

building  erected  in  1839,  under  the  superintendence  of  Dr. 
A.  W.  Cummings.  The  chapel  was  replastered  and  painted ; 
and  a  primary  room,  with  improved  seats,  was  fitted  up  in 
the  seminary  building. 

At  the  opening  of  the  fall  term  of  1861  William  Osband, 
A.B.,  succeeded  Mr.  Kinney,  and  his  accomplished  wife 
became  preceptress.  They  were  graduates  of  Genesee 
College.  They  continued  three  years  in  the  seminary  with 
increasing  success.  During  Mr.  Roe's  administration  valua- 
ble additions  were  made  to  the  library  and  apparatus.  lie 
resigned  at  the  close  of  the  school  year  in  1863.  Rev.  G.  G. 
Dains,  A.M.,  was  the  next  principal  and  the  last  while  the 
school  remained  at  Gouverneur.  The  history  of  this  school 
under  its  new  name,  and  at  its  new  home,  is  condensed  from 
the  educational  number  of  the  "  iSTorthern  Christian  Advo- 
cate "  of  December,  1883.  Before  inviting  attention  to  the 
brief  chapter  upon  Ives  Seminary,  some  few  of  the  students 
at  Gouverneur  are  introduced  as  witnesses  to  the  good  work 
there  accomplished. 

THE   STUDENTS 

of  the  Gouverneur  Wesley  an  Seminary  were  mostly  the 
children  of  the  prosperous  farmers  scattered  over  those  five 
dairy  counties,  St.  Lawrence,  Franklin,  Clinton,  Jefferson,  and 
Lewis,  in  New  York,  and  the  province  of  Ontario,  in  Canada. 
The  boys  had  been  inured  to  labor  on  the  farms,  and  the 
young  ladies  had  been  the  aids  to  their  mothers  in  domestic 
cares  and  labors.  When  the  opportunity  came  to  spend  a 
few  terms  or  years  in  a  higher  institution  of  learning  they 
improved  it,  not  merely  in  acquiring  the  accomplishments  to 
shine  in  the  drawing-room,  and  to  be  leaders  in  fashionable 
circles,  but  to  secure  the  preparations  of  heart  and  mind  for 


GouvEBNEtJB  Wesley  AN  Seminaky.  291 

life's  duties.  Yery  many  of  the  young  men  found  it  neces- 
sary to  supplement  the  aid  received  from  home  in  paying 
their  expenses,  by  the  rewards  of  their  own  labors  through 
the  long  vacation  as  teachers  or  in  other  employments.  The 
energy  and  health  developed  by  such  activities  and  self-reli- 
ances generally  bore  fruit  in  after  life. 

Looking  over  the  list  of  students  for  two  years,  unfortu- 
nately the  only  catalogues  of  the  Gouverneur  Seminary 
which  have  survived  the  changes  and  removals  of  the  more 
than  forty  years  since  I  left  Gouverneur,  I  am  almost  ready 
to  accept  as  true  a  remark  in  a  letter  recently  received  from 
one  of  the  students  of  those  early  years,  given  as  a  proverb, 
"  It  is  unfortunate  for  a  boy  in  this  country  to  be  born  of 
rich  parents."  William  Bourne,  Walter  B.  Allen,  George 
Seymour  attained  high  position  and  wealth  as  merchants  in 
their  native  county,  St.  Lawrence  ;  Charles  Cone,  as  a  rail- 
road man,  in  Chicago ;  Charles  Parsons,  as  a  banker,  in  West- 
ern New  York.  Levi  Parsons  died  early  in  St.  Louis,  Mo., 
but  he  lived  long  enough  to  demonstrate  his  capabilities  for 
success  and  the  yearnings  of  his  heart  for  a  life  of  usefulness. 
From  the  class  of  young  men  in  the  Sunday-school  <^  one  of 
the  large  Presbyterian  churches,  he  became  one  of  the  lead- 
ers in  a  colony,  who  formed  a  new  and  useful  church  in  that 
great  city.  Charles  Graves  became  prominent  in  the  minis- 
try of  the  Baptist  Church,  Levi  W.  Norton  and  Bradley 
Phillips  in  the  Presbyterian  Church.  In  the  ministry  of 
Methodism  the  following  rendered  at  least  good  average  serv- 
ice :  William  Peck,  brother  of  the  Bishop ;  Adam  C.  Green, 
Isaac  Sprague,  Morenus  Thrasher,  Justin  T.  Alden,  G.  W. 
Plank,  A.  O.  Wightman,  A.  S.  Wightman,  E.  G.  Derby, 
Otis  M.  Legate,  Samuel  W.  Bowdish  and  two  brothers. 
J  as.  A.  Dean  was  graduated  from  the  Wesleyau  Univensity, 


292  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

and  became  prominent  in  Methodism  as  a  teacher,  preacher, 
and  author.  John  B.  Cocagne  (Cokine)  served  as  mission- 
ary to  the  French  population  of  l^ew  York  and  of  other 
cities.  He  was  lost  at  sea  on  a  voyage  to  his  native  France. 
Stillman  Dean  became  distinguished  as  a  physician  and 
author.  Edward  Ci*ary,  George  Morris,  Charles  Rich,  Dex- 
ter E.  Wright,  W.  li.  Wallace,  B.  H.  Vary,  David  A.  Stewart, 
Frederick  Bissell,  Chancey  Smith,  all  made  good  records  at 
the  bar,  and  several  of  them  upon  the  bench  of  New  York, 
and  in  other  States.  Charles  T.  Pooler  became  widely 
known  as  an  author  and  distinguished  teacher.  A.  J.  Co- 
nant,  A.M.,  the  sixth  in  the  line  of  descent  from  Roger 
Conant,  the  first  governor  of  the  Massachusetts  colony  settled 
at  Salem,  on  the  completion  of  his  academic  studies  in  the 
seminary  devoted  himself  to  art  studies  in  New  York  city 
for  twelve  years.  In  the  successful  practice  of  his  chosen 
profession  he  spent  twenty-five  years  in  St.  Louis,  Mo.  He 
devoted  much  time  and  money  to  the  study  of  the  antiqui- 
ties of  the  Mississippi  Yalley.  One  of  his  papers  upon  that 
subject  was  published  in  several  of  the  languages  of  Europe 
by  learned  societies  of  the  continent.  In  1879  he  published 
an  embellished  8vo.  volume,  "  Foot-Prints  of  Vanished  Races 
in  the  Mississippi  Yalley."  His  home  is  now  in  New  York. 
The  young  ladies  of  the  few  first  years  of  Gouverneur 
Seminary,  with  changed  names,  mostly  became  lost  to  the 
ken  of  their  former  teacher.  Miss  Mary  Alexander,  the 
daughter  of  one  of  the  best  friends  of  the  seminary,  became 
the  wife  of  Dr.  E.  Wentworth,  and  died  at  Carlisle,  Pa. 
Miss  Charity  A.  Ingerson  was  long  preceptress  at  Gouver- 
neur and  in  other  schools.  She  is  now  the  wife  of  David  A. 
Stewart,  and  resides  at  Minneapolis,  Minn.  Iler  sister,  Cor- 
delia, also  preceptress  at  Gouverneur,  has  for  many  years  been 


GouvERNEUR  Wesleyan  Seminary.  293 

the  useful  wife  of  the  Presbyterian  pastor  at  Camden,  N.  Y. 
Miss  Fiorilla  Alexander  founded  and  controlled,  to  the  time 
of  her  death,  a  ladies'  seminary  in  Lebanon,  Illinois.  She 
was  the  wife  of  Dr.  Cummings,  president  of  M'Kendree  Col- 
lege. She  died  in  1852.  A  memoir  of  her  was  published 
by  the  Southern  Methodist  Publishing  House,  under  the 
title,  *'The  Hidden  Life  Exemplified."  Kev.  Dr.  Bruce 
makes  honorable  mention  of  Alborn  M.  Fradenburg,  Charles 
IL  Guile,  ^y.  F.  Ball,  E.  G.  M.  Hall,  E.  S.  Cheeseman,  as 
able  and  useful  ministers.  Yirgil  C.  Hart  is  well  known  as 
missionary  to  China.  W.  A.  Brownell,  Ph.D.,  stands  high 
as  a  teacher.  Hon.  N.  M.  Curtis,  Harlow  Goddard,  and 
T.  W.  Osborn  distinguished  themselves  in  the  Union  army, 
as  well  as  in  civil  life.  Miss  Malona  M.  Smith  was  an  able 
teacher  of  painting  in  the  seminary.  Miss  Mary  E.  Walling 
was  a  foreign  missionary  of  the  Baptist  Church.  Professor 
Eoe  mentions  E.  Horr,  D.D.,  Eev.  J.  H.  Merritt,  Kev.  H. 
W.  Coyden,  of  the  Presbyterian  Church  ;  Rev.  J.  S.  Blan- 
ton,  of  the  Baptist  Church;  Rev.  S.  N.  Rulison,  of  the 
Episcopal  Church ;  Dr.  O.  H.  Blanton  and  Dr.  C.  M.  Wilson, 
as  having  been  leading  students  during  his  administration. 
Northern  New  York  and  the  world  owes  much  to  the  Gon- 
verneur  Wesleyan  Seminary. 


294  Eably  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTEE  XYI. 

IVES     SEMINARY* 

Ives  Seminary,  of  the  Northern  ISTew  York  Conference, 
located  at  Antwerp,  Jefferson  Co.,  N.  Y.,  is  the  connectional 
school  of  the  Conference,  bearing  the  same  relation  to  it  that 
Cazenovia  Seminary  does  to  the  Central  New  York  Confer- 
ence, or  Lima  Seminary  to  the  Genesee  Conference.  It  is 
the  outgrowth  of  Gonverneur  Wesleyan  Seminary,  and  to 
see  its  historical  connection  therewith  we  must  go  back  to 
the  year  1837,  when  the  Black  River  Conference  took  the 
Grammar  School  of  Gouverneur  under  its  patronage  as  their 
Conference  Seminary,  with  Kev.  Jesse  T.  Peck,  afterward 
Bishop,  recently  deceased,  as  the  first  principal.  This  semi- 
nary remained  under  the  patronage  of  the  Methodist  Episco- 
pal Church  until  1869,  at  which  time  the  building  and  facil- 
ities being  deemed  inadequate  to  the  wants  of  the  institu- 
tion, it  was  transferred  to  Antwerp,  with  the  acquiescence  of 
the  alumni.  The  following  persons  were  principals  of  the 
seminary  while  at  Gouverneur : 

Rev.  Jesse  T.  Peck  (elected  Bishop  in  1872),  1837-1840 ; 
Rev.  L.  L.  Knox,  1840-1842 ;  Rev.  Anson  W.  Cummings, 
1842-1844;  Rev.  J.  W.  Armstrong,  1844-1850;  Professor 
WiUiam  W.  Clark,  1850-1853  ;  Rev.  E.  C.  Bruce,  1853-1860 ; 
Rev.  A.  Roe,  1860-1863 ;  Rev.  G.  G.  Dains,  1863-1868. 

With  such  a  succession  of  eminent  drincipals  tlie  institu- 
tion acquired  an  excellent  and  enviable  reputation,  and  many 
an  alumnus  of  prominence  and  influence  in  different  parts 
*  From  the  "  Northern  Christian  Advocate." 


Ives  Seminary.  295 

of  our  great  country  looks  back  witli  profound  satisfaction 
to  the  days  spent  within  the  walls  of  the  old  Conference 
Seminary  at  Gouverneur. 

In  the  year  1868,  under  the  administration  of  Rev.  Lcrauel 
Clark,  presiding  elder  of  Ogdensburg  District,  who  acted  in 
behalf  of  the  Conference,  upon  conditions  submitted  by  Di-. 
I.  S.  Bingham  to  the  stockholders  of  the  Antwerp  Liberal 
Literary  Institute,  July  25,  and  by  them  accepted,  their  very 
substantial  stone  building,  one  hundred  and  five  by  fifty 
feet,  and  three  stories  high,  with  its  ample  grounds  and  ap- 
purtenances, valued  at  $17,500,  were  made  a  gift  in  perpetu- 
ity to  the  Conference  upon  the  simple  condition  that  they 
maintain  a  school  of  academic  grade ;  and  at  the  next  session 
of  the  Legislature  the  name  was  changed  to  the  Black  River 
Conference  Seminary. 

In  the  fall  of  1868  the  Black  River  Conference  Seminary 
was  opened  in  its  new  location  at  Antwerp,  with  Professor 
G.  G.  Dains  as  its  principal.  In  1870,  under  the  supervision 
of  Rev.  Lemuel  Clark,  the  new  and  beautiful  boarding  and 
ladies'  hall,  seventy-two  by  forty-three  feet,  four  stories  high, 
was  commenced,  and  at  length  completed,  costing  $14,000. 
Thus  it  will  be  seen  the  seminary  has  buildings  not  only  im- 
posing in  appearance,  but  abundantly  large  to  afford  accom- 
modations and  facilities  for  a  first-class  Conference  seminary. 
This  noble  property,  as  it  stands  to-day,  with  its  apparatus 
and  furniture,  is  worth,  at  a  moderate  estimate,  $4:0,000. 

The  princi])als  who  have  presided  over  the  seminary  since 
its  location  at  Antwerp  are  as  follows:  Rev.  G.  G.  Dains, 
1S68-1869;  Rev.  E.  C.  Bruce,  1869-1871;  Professor  S.  M. 
Coon,  1871-1872  ;  Professor  J.  R.  Gordon,  1872-1873 ;  Rev. 
G.  G.  Dains,  1873-1875;  Rev.  M.  A.  Yeeder,  1875-1878; 
Rev.  G.  G.  Dains,  1878-1880 ;  Rev.  C.  E.  Hawkins,  1880-1885. 


296  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

In  the  spring  of  1873  the  trustees,  impressed  with  the 
importance  of  placing  the  seminary  upon  a  sound  financial 
basis,  gathered  a  meeting  of  the  chief  citizens  of  Antwerp, 
together  with  a  number  of  the  preachers,  which  continued 
two  days,  and  to  which  they  had  invited  the  late  Rev.  E.  O. 
Haven,  D.D.,  then  secretary  of  the  Board  of  Education  of 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  As  a  result  of  their  delib- 
erations it  was  resolved  to  raise  a  fund  of  at  least  $30,000 — 
a  portion  of  which  should  be  used  to  pay  the  debt  of  tlie 
school  and  the  balance  to  be  invested  as  a  permanent  fund 
for  its  support.  Hon.  W.  Ives,  of  "Watertown,  N.  Y., 
promptly  headed  the  subscription  w^ith  $8,000,  and  the  trust- 
ees and  citizens  of  Antwerp  about  $2,000  more. 

At  the  ISTorthern  New  York  Conference,  just  at  hand,  this 
action  was  heartily  indorsed,  and  the  Eev.  E.  E.  Kellogg 
(recently  deceased)  was  put  into  the  field  as  agent  to  raise 
the  money,  the  subscriptions  to  become  binding  when  the 
sum  of  $20,000  was  reached.  For  two  years  he  labored 
faithfully  in  this  work,  obtaining  in  all  about  $26,000.  At 
the  Conference  in  1875  a  desperate  effort  was  made  to  push 
the  amount  up  to  $30,000,  and,  from  motives  of  economy, 
the  aojent  was  discontinued.  Meantime  the  actual  liabilities 
of  the  seminary  had  accumulated  until  they  reached  the 
sum  of  $14,000,  leaving  a  balance  for  endowment,  after  all 
debts  were  paid,  as  it  would  appear,  of  $16,000.  It  should 
be  stated,  however,  that  a  pending  subscription  of  $2,000 
was  never  secured  ;  that  the  remaining  $14,000  was  in 
pledges  of  the  preachers  and  people,  quite  a  portion  of 
which,  in  view  of  the  financial  pressure  which  rested  upon 
the  country,  together  witli  other  causes  wiiich  might  be 
named,  was  never  realized. 

From  this  frank  statement  of  facts,  by  one  who  has  had 


Ives  Seminary.  297 

ample  but  painful  opportunity  to  know,  it  will  appear  that 
what  was  meant  to  be  an  endowment  fund  of  $12,000  or 
$14,000  has  actually  been  consumed  in  meeting  the  running 
expenses  of  the  seminary,  so  that  now  we  have  not  a  dollar 
of  endowment.  It  is  not  known,  however,  but  b}^  few,  that 
over  and  above  all  his  former  gifts,  the  Hon.  W.  Ives  paid 
last  year  (with  the  aid  of  three  or  four  other  trustees,  who 
gave  about  $350)  the  sum  of  between  $3,000  and  $4,000  to 
liquidate  the  last  dollar  of  indebtedness  upon  our  Conference 
Seminary. 

It  is  proper  to  state  that  the  name,  "  Ives  Seminary,"  was 
given  to  the  institution  in  1873,  when,  on  account  of  State 
legislation,  it  became  necessary  to  sever  its  connection  with 
the  Conference  to  secure  the  aid  which  the  State  bestows 
upon  schools  of  academic  grade  from  the  Regents'  funds, 
and  also  in  honor  of  the  man  who  has  given  so  many  thou- 
sand dollars  for  its  support.  The  seminary  now,  and  for 
the  last  three  years,  has  been  placed  by  the  trustees  and  the 
Conference  under  the  able  management  of  Rev.  C.  E.  Haw- 
kins, through  whose  persevering  and  encouraging  efforts  the 
school  has  been  carried  along  free  of  any  debt,  and  is  having 
a  larger  number  of  scholars  and  a  greater  degree  of  prosper- 
ity than  ever  before.  The  tide  evidently  is  turning  in  favor 
of  Christian  schools,  and  the  people  show'  an  increasing  de- 
sire to  send  their  sons  and  daughters  to  our  Conference 
Seminary. 

The  faculty  for  1885  were :  Rev.  James  E.  Ensign,  A.M., 
principal ;  Mrs.  J.  E.  Ensign,  B.P.,  preceptress  ;  Rev.  George 
E.  Ilutchings,  A.M.,  Prof.  Charles  L.  Williams,  Prof. 
Charles  W.  Smith,  Miss  Emilie  Benner,  Miss  Lucy  M.  Wig- 
gins, Mrs.  Annis  Sterling  Hall,  Frank  L.  Mead,  I.  E.  Mai-sh, 

C.  W.  Smith,  and  Miss  Anna  L.  Johnson,  instructors, 
13* 


Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTER  XYII. 

PENNINGTON    SEMINARY. 

BY  THOMAS  HANLON,   D.D. 

While  the  !N"ew  Jersey  Conference  was  yet  a  part  of  the 
Pliiladelphia,  that  Conference  resolved  to  found  a  Conference 
Seminary,  and  raised  a  committee  to  ask  for  contributions 
and  fix  upon  a  location.  Pemberton  and  Pennington  both 
took  a  lively  interest  in  securing  the  new  seminary.  While 
this  question  was  pending  New  Jersey  Conference  was  set 
off  from  the  Philadelphia,  in  1837. 

When  New  Jersey  Conference  was  only  two  years  old, 
mainly  through  the  efforts  of  Kev.  John  K.  Shaw,  an  itiner- 
ant minister  of  precious  memory,  and  Eev.  Henry  Baker,  a 
local  preacher  of  spotless  character,  still  living  in  Penning- 
ton, it  was  determined  to  locate  a  seminary  in  Pennington, 
Kew  Jersey. 

Early  in  the  month  of  May,  1839,  the  corner-stone  was 
laid.  Bishops  Hedding  and  Waugli  officiating.  Bishop  Hed- 
ding  made  the  principal  address,  which  is  remembered  at 
this  date,  by  those  who  heard  it,  as  a  very  able  effort,  showing 
education  to  be  one  of  the  good  and  perfect  gifts  of  God, 
and  that  it  should  always  be  under  religious  control. 

In  the  spring  of  1840  the  seminary  was  opened.  Howard 
Bishop,  a  graduate  of  Eutgcrs  College,  New  Jersey,  eminent 
both  for  piety  and  learning,  took  charge,  temporarily,  of  the 
school  until  a  principal  was  elected.  He  was  a  man  of  rare 
qualifications  for  his  work.     He  was  a  born  teacher.     He 


Pennington  Seminary.  209 

died  early,  but  tlie  sweet  fragrance  of  his  saintly  life  still 
linirers  as  a  rich  benediction  to  the  school. 

In  the  autumn  of  1840  Edward  Cook,  D.D.,  was  elected  the 
fii-st  principal  of  Pennington  Seminary.  Dr.  Cook  was  born 
in  New  Hampshire,  in  1812,  and  was  graduated  at  Wesleyan 
University  in  1838.  He  remained  at  the  head  of  the  school 
for  seven  years.  His  administration  was  very  successful ;  he 
was  especially  fortunate  in  having  associated  with  him  How- 
ard Bishop,  already  named.  Dr.  Cook  was  sprightly,^ very 
alert,  genial,  and  firm  in  discipline,  a  good  teacher,  an  able 
preacher,  and  a  good  business  manager.  In  1847  Dr.  Cook 
was  succeeded  by  Stephen  M.  Yail,  D.D.,  who  afterward  be- 
came the  fii-st  professor  of  Hebrew  in  our  first  Theological 
Seminary  at  Concord,  New  Hampshire.  Dr.  Yail  was  born 
in  the  State  of  New  York,  in  1818,  was  graduated  at  Bow- 
doin  College  in  1838,  and  at  the  Union  Theological  Semi- 
nary, New  York  city,  in  1842.  He  entered  the  New  York 
Conference,  and  remained  in  the  pastoral  work  until  called 
to  the  presidency  of  Pennington  Seminary,  where  he  re- 
mained only  two  years,  when,  at  the  urgent  solicitation  of 
that  great  man  of  God,  Dr.  Dempster,  the  founder  of  our 
theological  schools,  he  entered  upon  his  work  as  teacher  of 
Hebrew  at  our  Biblical  Institute  at  Concord,  where  he  re- 
mained nineteen  years.  Dr.  Yail  was  a  scholarly  and  genial 
man,  much  beloved  and  respected  as  the  head  of  the  school. 
He  wjis  succeeded,  in  1849,  by  J.  Townley  Crane,  D.D.,  who 
was  born  in  New  Jersey  in  1819,  and  was  graduated  at  Prince- 
ton College  in  1843.  He  was  engaged  in  the  pastoral  work 
as  a  member  of  New  Jersey  Conference  when  elected  prin- 
cipal of  Pennington  Seminary.  The  firet  marked  feature  of 
Dr.  Crane's  administration  was  the  purchase  of  the  seminary 
from  the  stockholders.     This  purchase  by  the  Conference 


300  Early  Schools  of  Mkttiodism. 

was  made  about  1850.  Up  to  that  date  the  school  buildings 
were  owned  by  stockholders,  but  the  'New  Jersey  Conference 
had  charge  of  the  school.  In  1853,  under  Dr.  Crane,  and 
mainly  by  his  energy,  a  large  addition  was  built  for  the  ac- 
commodation of  lady  students.  Previously  the  school  had 
been  exclusively  for  boys.  The  addition  was  completed  with 
great  dispatch,  and  opened  in  the  winter  of  that  year  for 
lady  pupils.  The  number  entering  was  large,  almost  filling 
the  new  building.  In  1852  the  Alpha  Omega  Society  was 
organized,  and  a  beautiful  hall  for  this  was  erected.  This  is 
the  oldest  of  the  three  literary  societies  of  the  seminary,  and 
it  has  had  a  very  vigorous  history.  Thus  it  will  be  seen  that 
the  seminary,  during  Dr.  Crane's  administration,  passed 
through  two  important  epochs,  namely,  the  purchase  of  the 
property  by  the  New  Jersey  Conference  and  the  addition  of 
the  female  department.  Dr.  Crane  gave  nine  of  the  best 
and  most  effective  years  of  his  busy  and  useful  life  to  this 
institution.  He  was  an  able  preacher,  temperance  lecturer, 
teacher,  and  author.  His  manner  was  most  agreeable,  his 
life  full  of  sunshine  and  good  cheer. 

In  1858  Dr.  Crane  re-entered  the  pastoral  work,  and  Isaac 
W.  Wiley,  M.D.,  afterward  Bishop  of  the  Methodist  Episco- 
pal Church,  was  elected  president  of  the  seminary.  Dr. 
Wiley  brought  with  him  a  great  deal  of  prestige ;  he  had 
been  missionary  to  China  ;  he  ranked  high  as  a  preacher,  and 
as  such  was  already  widely  known.  The  patronage  of  the 
seminary  was  at  once  unusually  large,  even  beyond  the  capac- 
ity of  the  buildings.  The  Callilogian  and  Philomathean  So- 
cieties were  founded  during  this  administration.  In  1863, 
owing  in  part  to  bad  health.  Dr.  Wiley,  to  the  great  regret 
of  the  friends  and  patrons  of  the  school,  resigned  the  pres- 
idency  and   returned  to  pastoral  work.      He  was   born  in 


Pennington  Skminary.  301 

Fennsylvania  in  1825,  was  graduated  in  medicine  in  1840,  and 
went  iis  missionary  to  China  in  1850,  where  he  spent  four 
yeai*s.  He  was  elected  president  of  Pennington  Seminary  in 
1858,  to  the  editorship  of  the  "Ladies'  Eepository"  in  1864-, 
and  to  the  episcopacy  in  1872.  In  this  last  high  office  he 
served  the  Church  laboriously  for  over  twelve  years,  when, 
in  China,  he  fell  asleep  in  Jesus.  There,  in  our  beautiful 
mission  cemetery,  his  body  rests  beside  the  remains  of  his 
first  wife,  awaiting  the  resurrection  of  the  just. 

In  1863  Rev.  D.  C.  Knowles,  A.M.,  was  placed  at  the  head 
of  the  institution,  where  he  remained  for  four  years,  when 
he  entered  pastoral  work. 

Thomas  Hanlon,  D.D.,  was  called  to  the  presidency  in 
1867.  During  the  centennial  year  of  American  Methodism, 
1866,  efforts  were  made  to  raise  funds  for  enlarging  the 
school  buildings.  These  efforts  justified  the  trustees  in 
building  a  chapel  and  in  adding  a  wing  on  the  west  of  the 
school  edifice.  This  wing  was  one  hundred  feet  long,  forty 
feet  wide,  and  four  stories  high,  and  was  exclusively  devoted 
to  the  accommodation  of  a  ladies'  department.  A  large  in- 
crease of  students  resulted  from  these  improvements.  Dr. 
Ilanlon  remained  at  the  head  of  the  school  six  years,  when 
he  resigned  to  gratify  his  yearning  desire  for  the  pastoral 
work,  to  which  he  had  formerly  given  fifteen  yeai*s  of  active 
service.  Ho  was  succeeded  in  the  presidency  of  the  semi- 
nary by  Rev.  Joseph  A.  Dilks,  a  native  of  New  Jersey,  and 
an  alumnus  of  Wesleyan  University.  Mr.  Dilks  had,  for 
the  three  preceding  years,  been  vice-president  of  the  institu- 
tion. He  was  an  able  teacher,  a  good  scholar.  He  en- 
tered active  work  in  the  New  Jersey  Conference  in  1876. 

Dr.  Ilanlon  was  now  recalled  to  the  seminary.  He  was 
born  in  New  York  city  in  1832,  entered  the  New  Jersey 


302  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Conference  in  1853,  was  graduated  at  Princeton  College  in 
1863,  returned  to  the  cliarge"  of  the  seminary  in  1876,  where 
lie  continues  to  the  present,  having  rendered  sixteen  years  of 
service.  During  his  present  incumbency  many  valuable  im- 
provements have  been  made.  Mansard  stories  have  been 
added  to  the  middle  section  and  to  the  east  wing  of  the 
edifice,  giving  it  a  far  more  symmetrical  and  imposing  archi- 
tectural appearance.  New  and  beautiful  halls  have  been 
built  for  the  Philomathean  and  Callilogian  literary  societies. 
Water,  hot  and  cold,  has  been  introduced  into  all  parts  of  the 
buildings,  furnishing  bath-rooms  and  other  conveniences 
demanded  by  modern  taste.  All  the  buildings  are  now 
heated  with  steam  and  lighted  with  gas,  and  their  exterior 
and  interior  appearance  much  improved.  Gymnasiums  have 
been  built  and  fully  equipped  for  the  ladies  and  gentlemen. 
Tlie  most  perfect  sanitary  arrangements,  both  for  the  health 
and  comfort  of  the  students,  have  been  made. 

A  complete  commercial  college  has  been  added  to  the  al- 
ready numerous  courses  of  instruction.  Within  the  year 
$25,000  have  been  spent  in  making  these  great  improve- 
ments. In  fact  the  seminary,  in  all  its  conveniences  and 
comforts,  has  been  made  all  that  its  friends  and  patrons  could 
desire.  For  these  reasons,  as  well  as  for  its  high  character 
as  a  school  of  intense  religious  life  and  sound  learning,  the 
prospects  of  the  seminary  were  never  so  bright  as  now.  All 
we  can  ask  for  now,  more  than  we  have,  is  that  some  good 
friend  of  Christian  learning  will  give  us  an  ample  endow- 
ment.    This  we  hope  to  have  in  the  near  future. 

One  of  the  striking  features  of  Pennington  Seminary  has 
been  its  intense  religious  life.  No  Conference  seminary 
has  better  fulfilled  the  design  of  its  founders,  which  was  that 
it  might   promote  sound  learning  and  deep  piety  in  its  pu- 


Pennington  Seminary.  303 

])ils.  There  has  not  been  a  year  in  its  history  in  which  there 
lias  not  been  a  religious  revival  of  more  or  less  power.  This 
valuable  fact  in  the  history  of  the  seminary  is  to  be  ac- 
counted for  in  part  by  another  striking  fact,  namely,  that 
from  the  first  it  has,  in  a  remarkable  degree,  been  a  school  of 
the  prophets.  The  records  will  show  that  in  forty-seven 
years  of  the  seminary  history,  there  have  been  enrolled  as 
students  at  least  six  hundred  young  men  and  ladies  who 
have  entered  the  Gospel  ministry  or  foreign  mission  fields. 
At  this  writing  we  have  alurani  in  Bulgaria,  India,  Japan, 
Africa,  and  South  America.  And  for  many  years,  Mrs.  Dr. 
Baldwin,  now  of  Boston,  Mass.,  did  distinguished  mission  work 
in  China.  The  number  of  students  preparing  for  the  ministry 
and  foreign  mission  work  is  constantly  increasing.  We  have 
forty-three  such  enrolled  at  present,  about  twenty-five  per  cent, 
of  the  whole  number  now  in  attendance.  Of  these  forty-three 
students  about  one  fourth  expect  to  enter  some  foreign  mission 
field.  In  our  own  country  our  alumni  in  this  holy  calling 
are  numerous  and  widely  scattered.  One  third  of  the  minis- 
ters of  the  New  Jersey  Conference  are  alumni  of  Penning- 
ton. Many  of  them  are  in  the  Philadelphia  Conference,  and 
a  few  of  them  scattered  throughout  all  the  Conferences. 
There  is  not  a  territory  that  has  not  some  of  our  students  in 
the  work  of  teaching  or  preaching.  Thus  it  will  be  seen 
that  Pennington  Seminary  has  had  an  intense  religious  life. 

We  cannot,  in  this  brief  article,  even  name  all  our  distin- 
guished alumni  J  I  will  name  those  especially  whom  I  person- 
ally know,  remarking  that  any  omissions  I  may  make  will  bo 
due  to  my  limited  knowledge  of  the  eai-lier  alumni,  and  to 
the  fact  of  limited  space  allowed  me  for  this  article.  J.  M. 
Buckley,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  now  editor  of  "  The  Christian  Advo- 
cate," is  a  distinguished  journalist,  writer,  lecturer,  preacher, 


304  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

and  debater.  He  was  born  in  Kew  Jersey  about  1837,  edu- 
cated at  Pennington  Seminary  and  Wesleyan  University, 
and  studied  theology  at  Exeter,  IST.  H.  He  joined  the  New 
Hampshire  Conference  in  1858,  and  has  served  as  pastor 
some  churches  in  New  Hampshire,  Detroit,  New  York,  and 
New  York  East  Conferences.  He  was  elected  editor  of  "  The 
Christian  Advocate"  in  1880,  and  re-elected  in  1884.  He 
has  shown  himself  to  be  as  able  on  the  editorial  staff  as  he 
was  in  the  pastorate.  Professor  Borden  P.  Bowne,  now  of 
the  Boston  University,  is  a  very  distinguislied  scholar.  He 
ranks  among  the  first  metaphysicians  in  this  or  any  other 
country.  He  is  also  the  distinguished  author  of  "  Philosophy 
of  Herbert  Spencer,"  "Studies  in  Theism,"  "Metaphysics," 
and  "  Introduction  to  Psychological  Theory."  He  is  a  native 
of  New  Jersey,  was  graduated  at  Pennington  Seminary  in 
1866,  and  at  New  York  University  in  1871,  studied  in  Ger- 
many two  years,  and  was  elected  to  his  present  chair  in  Boston 
University  in  1876.  J.  A.  Lippincott,  now  chancellor  of  the 
Kansas  State  University,  was  born  in  New  Jersey  and  edu- 
cated at  Pennington  Seminary  and  Dickinson  College.  He 
served  a  few  years  in  the  pastoral  work  as  a  member  of  the 
Newark  and  Central  Pennsylvania  Conferences.  The  most 
of  his  life  has  been  spent  in  teaching.  He  has  taught  in  Pen- 
nington Seminary,  Lippincott  Collegiate  Institute,  Baltimore, 
the  New  Jersey  State  Normal  and  Model  Schools,  Dickinson 
College,  and  in  Kansas  State  University,  where  for  four 
years  he  has  filled  the  office  of  chancellor  with  acceptability 
and  usefulness.  Kev.  Edwin  Post,  A.M.,  Professor  of  Latin 
in  De  Pauw  University,  Indiana,  where  he  has  served  for 
several  years  with  marked  efficiency,  is  an  eminent  Greek 
and  Latin  scholar.  He  is  a  native  of  New  Jersey,  was  grad- 
uated at  Pennington  Seminary  in  1867,  and  at  Dickinson 


Pennington  Seminary.  305 

College  in  1871.  He  taught  the  classics  at  Pennington  for 
some  years  with  eminent  efficiency. 

J.  T.  Edwards,  D.D.,  now  president  of  the  Chamberlain 
Institute  and  Female  College,  Eandolph,  N.  Y.,  has  long 
occupied  a  conspicuous  place  in  the  educational  work  of  the 
Church.  He  was  born  in  New  Jersey  in  1838,  was  graduated 
at  Pennington  Seminary  in  1856,  and  at  Wesleyan  University 
in  1860,  was  teacher  in  Amenia  Seminary,  also  in  East  Green- 
wich Seminary,  was  afterward  president  of  the  same,  and  in 
1870  was  elected  president  of  Chamberlain  Institute,  where 
he  still  remains.  He  did  distinguished  service  in  the  late 
civil  war,  both  as  a  private  and  as  an  officer.  He  has  served 
as  State  senator  several  sessions  in  the  State  of  New  York, 
and,  during  one  session  of  the  Legislature,  was  chairman  of 
the  Committee  on  Education. 

Kev.  D.  C.  Knowles,  A.M.,  was  born  in  Kew  Jersey  in 
1836,  was  graduated  at  Pennington  Seminary  in  1860,  was 
teacher  in  Troy  Conference  Academy,  Pittsburg  Female  Col- 
lege, and  Pennington  Seminary,  and  is  now  the  president  of 
the  New  Hampshire  Conference  Seminary.  He  also  served 
as  private  and  officer  in  the  Union  army. 

Wm.  P.  Headden,  Ph.D.,  was  born  in  New  Jersey  about 
1850,  was  graduated  at  Pennington  in  1869,  and  at  Dickin- 
son College  in  1872.  He  is  an  eminent  chemist,  and  has 
taught  in  the  University  of  Pennsylvania,  the  Naval  Acad- 
emy at  Annapolis,  and  is  now  professor  in  the  Hiff  Univer- 
sity at  Denver,  Colorado. 

Milton  S.  Yail,  A.M.,  son  of  Stephen  M.  Yail,  D.D.,  was 
graduated  at  Pennington  Seminary  in  1869,  and  at  Columbia 
College  about  1874.  Mr.  Yail  is  at  the  head  of  our  school 
in  Japan,  under  the  presidency  of  Kev.  Dr.  Maclay.  B.  G. 
Peck  was  graduated  at  Pennington  Seminary,  1879,  studied 


306  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

law  and  was  admitted  to  the  bar,  but  afterward  accepted  a 
responsible  position  under  tlie  government  at  the  head  of 
the  Indian  schools  in  Washington  Territory.  Rev.  Joseph 
A.  Dilks,  A.M.,  already  referred  to,  was  a  student  in  Pen- 
nington Seminary.  John  Russell  Hanlon,  A.  M.,  now  vice- 
principal  of  the  seminary,  is  a  graduate  of  Yale  College,  and 
doing  effective  work  in  the  cause  of  Christian  education. 
It  will  be  seen  from  the  preceding  list  of  names  that  the 
seminary  has  not  only  directly,  but  indirectly,  been  a  great 
power  in  the  educational  work  of  the  Church. 

Pennington  Seminary  is  also  distinguished  for  the  elo- 
quent preachers  among  her  alumni.  In  this  list  we  place 
the  names  of  Alphonso  Willetts,  D.D.,  J.  M.  Buckley,  D.D., 
LL.D.,  George  W.  Batchelder,  A.M.,  Henry  Baker,  A.M., 
A.  J.  Palmer,  A.M.,  J.  T.  Dobbins,  A.M.,  Joseph  Knowles, 
D.D.,  Robert  L.  Stratton,  D.D.,  William  Y.  Kelley,  D.D., 
and  Geo.  K.  Morris,  D.D.  These  brethren,  except  George 
W.  Batchelder,  have  been  called  from  Conference  to  Confer- 
ence to  fill  leading  pulpits.  Mr.  Batchelder  died  too  early  to 
take  any  Conference  transfers.  He  closed  his  ministry  at  the 
early  age  of  twenty-eight.  It  is,  perliaps,  not  too  much  to 
say  of  him,  that  since  Summerfield  he  has  had  no  superior, 
for  his  age,  in  the  American  pulpit.  In  form,  in  gesture,  in 
countenance,  in  saintliness  of  expression  bordering  on  the 
supernatural,  in  clear  and  original  thought,  in  graceful  utter- 
ance and  manner,  in  the  white-heat  earnestness  that  consti- 
tutes the  very  soul  of  eloquence,  George  W.  Batchelder  will 
always,  perhaps,  stand  alone  in  the  memory  of  those  who 
heard  him. 

Our  seminary  has  long  been  noted  for  its  missionary  spirit. 
More  than  twenty  years  ago  Miss  Esther  E.  Jerman  went 
out  from  us  in  the  class  of  1859.     She  married  S.  L.  Bald- 


Pennington  Seminary.  307 

win,  D.D.,  and,  with  him,  for  many  years  did  conspicuous 
missionary  service  in  China.  Since  her  return  to  our  shores 
she  has  done  equally  effective  service  in  her  appeals  to  large 
audiences  in  behalf  of  China. 

Miss  Lucilla  A.  Green,  M.D.,  Miss  Edna  Taylor,  Miss 
Emma  Knowles,  Miss  Mary  C.  Elliott ;  and  Messrs.  \Yilliam 
Stephens,  John  Webb,  William  Bruer,  and  George  Greening 
have  all  gone  out  from  this  seminary  to  India ;  the  four  gen- 
tlemen and  Miss  Taylor  under  Bishop  Taylor. 

Milton  S.  Yail  and  Mrs.  Julia  Soper  entered  our  mis- 
sionary work  in  Japan.  William  Sumner,  M.D.,  and  Will- 
iam P.  Dodson  have  gone  to  Central  Africa  under  Bishop 
Taylor.  Lincoln  E.  Brown  and  Miss  Laura  J.  Hanlon  en- 
tered the  work  in  South  America,  also  under  Bishop  Taylor. 

More  and  more  the  spirit  of  Christ  is  taking  possession  of 
the  students,  constraining  them  to  carry  the  Gospel  into  the 
regions  beyond. 

Of  the  under-graduates  now  here  eight  or  ten  expect  to 
enter  foreign  missionary  work.  Time,  and  space  for  this  ar- 
ticle, prevent  me  from  mentioning  the  hundreds  of  our 
alumni  who  have  distinguished  themselves  in  law,  medicine, 
and  general  business  pursuits.  We  have  in  the  present  Legis- 
lature of  New  Jersey  several  of  our  aluinni,  namely :  The 
Hon.  Messrs.  Chattle,  Yanderbilt,  and  Cranmer  in  the  Senate, 
and  the  Hon.  Messrs.  Allcott  and  Baird  in  the  House  of 
licpresentatives.  The  Hon.  Robert  L.  Taylor,  one  of  our 
alumni^  has  for  years  been  a  member  of  Congress  in  the 
House  of  Representatives,  from  East  Tennessee. 

General  James  T.  Rusling  was  born  in  New  Jei-sey  in  1834, 
was  graduated  at  Pennington  in  1849,  and  at  Dickinson  in 
1852.  He  taught  in  Dickinson  Seminary,  studied  law,  and  was 
admitted  to  the  bar  in  1857.     He  entered  the  Union  army  as 


308  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

first  lieutenant  in  1861,  and  retired  from  the  service  in  1867, 
as  brevet  brigadier  -  general.  He  was  appointed  United 
States  Pension  Agent  for  New  Jersey  in  1869,  and  held  the 
office  till  it  was  abolished,  in  1877.  He  has  been  a  trustee  of 
Dickinson  College  and  Pennington  Seminary  for  many  years. 
General  Eusling  is  a  writer  of  considerable  repute.  His 
style  is  clear,  racy,  and  scholarly.  His  articles  in  "The 
Christian  Advocate,"  the  "  Methodist  Quarterly  Review," 
and  "  Harper's  Magazine  "  have  attracted  much  attention. 

George  G.  Green,  M.D.,  was  a  student  successively  at  Fort 
Edward  Institute,  Pennington  Seminary,  and  Dickinson  Col- 
lege. He  studied  medicine  at  the  University  of  Pennsyl- 
vania ;  entered  upon  a  remarkable  business  career  at  Wood- 
bury, N.  J.,  in  1873.  He  then  began  to  give  his  whole  atten- 
tion to  the  manufacture  of  patent  medicines.  In  less  than 
twelve  years  he  has  amassed  a  fortune  of  about  $2,000,000. 

Dr.  Green  is  a  warm  friend  of  his  alma  mater,  and  one 
of  its  trustees.  While  a  student  here  he  founded  the  Philo- 
mathean  Society,  and  was  its  first  president.  To  this  society 
he  has  donated  a  valuable  library,  called  the  George  G. 
Green  Library.  In  our  recent  improvements,  costing 
$25,000,  Dr.  Green  is  one  of  our  most  generous  benefactors. 

I  close  this  paper  with  one  other  item,  and,  though  last 
mentioned,  it  is  by  no  means  the  least  of  the  good  things  to 
be  said  of  Pennington  Seminary.  It  is  this :  We  never 
close  the  doors  of  the  school  against  a  worthy  young  man  or 
woman  seeking  an  education  because  he  or  she  is  poor. 
Helping  this  class  to  the  great  extent  we  have,  has  been  a 
great  tax  on  our  revenue  and  kept  us  poor. 

It  is  safe  to  say  that  in  the  forty-seven  years  of  our  his- 
tory we  have  spent  not  less  than  $50,000  in  helping  to  edu- 
cate worthy  young  men  and  women.     But,  while  we  have 


Pennington  Seminaey.  309 

been  kept  poor,  we  have  made  the  world  richer  by  giving 
to  it  hundreds  of  preachers  and  teachers  who  never  could 
have  given  their  lives  to  these  noble  missions  had  not  Pen- 
nington Seminary  given  them  this  timely  help  as  they  came 
to  us  from  the  shops  and  fields  seeking  an  education.  It 
is  partly  because  of  this  fact  that  God  has  so  eminently 
blessed  us  with  spiritual  blessings,  and  is  now  blessing  us 
with  friends  of  ample  means,  who,  I  believe,  will  yet  give 
Pennington  Seminary  an  ample  endowment. 

I  here  aflSx  the  names  of  the  present  board  of  trustees,  to 
whom  so  much  is  due  for  our  present  greatly  improved  and 
very  promising  condition. 

Board  of  Trustees. — President,  Hon.  C.  E.  Hendrick- 
son.  Mount  Holly ;  secretary  and  treasurer,  Hon.  William  H. 
Skirm,  Trenton ;  Kev.  E.  H.  Stokes,  D.D.,  Ocean  Grove ; 
General  Clinton  B.  Fisk,  Seabright;  Eev.  D.  H.  Schock, 
Asbury  Park ;  General  J.  F.  Eusling,  Trenton ;  James  S. 
Kiger,  Esq.,  Trenton ;  Rev.  A.  E.  Ballard,  Ocean  Grove ; 
Rev.  J.  Lewis,  D.D.,  Burlington  ;  Rev.  W.  ^Y.  Motfett,  Red 
Bank  ;  Rev.  J.  M.  Buckley,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  New  York  city ; 
Hon.  W.  S.  Yard,  Trenton ;  Rev.  J.  B.  Graw,  D.D.,  Bev- 
erly ;  G.  G.  Green,  M.D.,  Woodbury ;  J.  Ronan,  Esq.,  Tren- 
ton ;  C.  Myers,  Esq.,  New  Brunswick. 


310  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTEK  XYIII. 

THE    SCHOOLS    IN    BEREA,    OHIO. 

BY   REV.    A.    SCHUTLER,   LL.D. 

The  village  of  Berea,  O.,  was  organized  as  a  community 
in  1836.  This  community  was  formed  after  the  model  at 
Jerusalem,  as  given  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  where  the 
disciples  had  all  things  common.  But  as  the  millennial  age 
had  not  yet  dawned,  it  was  found  that  man  is,  by  nature, 
both  too  selfish  and  too  indolent  for  such  experiments  to  suc- 
ceed. After  a  short  trial,  not  exceeding  two  years,  the  ex- 
periment was  abandoned  as  impracticable.  There  have  been 
four  schools  of  higher  grade  in  Berea  —  three  successive, 
Berea  Seminary,  Baldwin  Institute,  and  Baldwin  University, 
and  one,  German  Wallace  College,  which  was  opened  a  few 
years  after  Baldwin  University.  We  propose  briefly  to 
sketch  the  history  of  Berea  Seminary,  Baldwin  Institute,  and 
Baldwin  University,  alluding  only  incidentally  to  German 
Wallace  College. 

Berea  Seminary. 

Berea  Seminary  was  chartered  by  the  General  Assembly 
of  the  State  of  Ohio  in  March,  1837.  It  was  found  that 
further  legislation  was  needed,  and  the  charter  was  amended 
by  an  act  giving  further  rights.  The  charter,  as  amended, 
gave  ample  authority  to  the  incorporators,  twelve  in  number, 
among  whom  were  Henry  O.  Sheldon,  John  Baldwin,  Ed- 
ward Thomson,  and  Ansel  J.  Pope.  The  property  consisted 
of  five  hundred  acres  of  land  on  the  east  branch  of  Bocky 
River,  twelve  miles  south-west  from  Cleveland.     The  land 


The  Schools  in  Berea,  Ohio.  311 

had  one  hundred  and  fifty  acres  under  improvement,  a  good 
water-power,  a  saw-mill  in  operation,  and  a  valuable  stone 
quarry.  The  stock  was  in  one  thousand  shares,  estimated  at 
$50  each,  of  which  not  more  than  ten  shares  could  be  held 
by  the  same  person.  The  plan  was  to  build  and  sustain  a 
"  working  school "  with  the  profits  of  the  property,  return- 
ing the  capital  to  the  stockholders,  or  affording  them  a  safe, 
and  at  the  same  time  a  philanthropic,  investment.  The  plan 
was  proposed  by  Josiah  Holbrook,  who  first  conceived  it  in 
1820,  to  start  a  lyceum  village,  which  was  to  be  the  foster 
community  to  the  seminary. 

We  quote  from  a  circular,  without  date  or  signature,  sup- 
posed to  have  been  issued  in  1841 : 

This  village  is  the  first  in  the  projected  connected  series  of  Lyceum 
Villages,  forming  desirable  residences  for  the  patrons  of  the  moral  and 
scientific  enterprises  of  the  age,  and  for  families  who  wish  to  give  a 
practical  and  business  education  to  their  children.  These  villages  are 
designed  especially  to  assist  the  education  of  teachers,  promote  scien- 
tific exchanges  over  the  worid,  and  thus  encourage  the  study  of  the 
works  2k\i(i  word  of  God,  and  cultivate  the  spirit  of  *'  peace  on  earth  and 
good- will  to  men."  It  is  expected  that  every  teacher  in  the  schools, 
and  every  scholar  of  sufl[icient  age,  will  spend  »ix  hours  each  day  at 
work.  Boys  and  young  men,  girls  and  young  ladies,  will  be  suitably 
employed  at  various  mechanical  arts,  particularly  the  preparation  and 
labeling  of  specimens  in  geology,  botany,  natural  history,  etc.,  for 
sale  and  exchange.  The  wages  paid  is  according  to  the  amount  of 
word  done. 

This  certainly  is  suflaciently  ndUve ;  but  one  wondere 
where  the  time  for  study  and  recitation  is  to  come  from,  to 
say  nothing  of  eating  and  sleep,  if  six  hours  are  to  be  spent 
each  day  at  labor.  We  also  quote  from  the  fragment  of  a 
pamphlet  issued  about  the  same  time,  having  neither  title- 


312  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

page,  (late,  nor  name  of  author,  but  whicli  is  understood  to  be 
the  work  of  Eev.  H.  O.  Sheldon : 

The  object  of  the  establishment  of  the  *'  Lyceum  Village  "  and  "  Be- 
rea  Seminary  "  is  to  assist  in  spreading  knowledge  and  holiness  over 
our  globe ;  to  redeem  man  from  ignorance  and  vice.  We  live  in  an  age 
unparalleled  in  the  history  of  man.  The  elements  of  society  arc  fer- 
menting. The  foundation  principles,  which  have  stood  for  ages,  are 
giving  way.  Light  is  bursting  upon  the  human  intellect.  Coming 
events,  a  mighty  train,  are  casting  their  shadows  upon  us.  .  .  . 

In  this  eventful  age  the  bells  of  duty  are  ringing  to  action;  the  tocsin 
calls  loud  upon  all  the  civilized  world  to  join  the  crusade  against  ig- 
norance ;  while  the  white  flag  of  peace  is  planted  upon  the  battlements 
of  crumbling  fortresses,  and  promises,  ere  long,  to  wave  triumphant 
over  a  regenerated  world.  Within  the  last  twenty-five  years  the  plan 
which  we  have  the  pleasure  to  present  to  your  consideration  has  been 
in  substance  suggested  to  the  minds  of  several  persons  in  different  cir- 
cumstances, at  different  times,  unknown  to  each  other.  Every  part  of 
this  plan  has,  in  the  mean  time,  triumphantly  stood  the  rigid  test  of 
experiment. 

Concerning  the  location  of  Lyceum  Village,  I  may  be  permitted  to 
say,  a  train  of  remarkably  striking  providences  singularly  directed  to 
the  place.  These  facts  have  not  been  given  to  the  public,  but  they 
have  been  given  to  various  individuals,  all  of  whom  have  expressed  the 
highest  interest  at  their  recital.  Berea  (the  name  given  to  the  village, 
as  singular  as  its  location,  was  providential)  is  sometimes  called  the 
**  Lyceum  Village,"  from  its  being  founded  by  the  author  of  the 
lyceum  system  for  lyceum  operations.  .  .  . 

In  the  system  of  instruction  pursued  at  the  Berea  Seminary  we  follow 
nature.  At  the  period  of  his  birth  man  is  entirely  uneducated.  He 
has  a  physical,  mental,  and  moral  nature,  all  requiring  education.  It 
is  well-known  that  one  part  of  man  can  be  educated  to  the  neglect  of 
the  others,  which  must  remain  comparatively  feeble.  I  venture  the 
assertion  there  is  little  or  no  valuable  education  but  self-education. 

I  must  not  forget  to  say,  we  shall  pay  particular  attention  to  female 
education.  I  believe  the  time  has  gone  by  when  Americans  believe 
**  women  have  no  souls,"  though  many  of  them  are  educated  much  as  if 


The  Schools  in  Berea,  Ohio.  313 

they  had  none,  but  were  mere  humming-birds,  destined  to  command 
admiration  for  their  music  or  their  feathers. 

These  extracts  show  tlie  spirit  of  the  enterprise ;  that  it 
liad  both  ideas  and  energy,  and  that  it  was  bound  to  suc- 
ceed. The  first  and  only  principal  of  Berea  Seminary  was 
Alfred  Holbrook,  son  of  Josiah  Holbrook.  Alfred  came  on 
horseback  from  Indiana.  Weary  and  sick,  he  stopped  at  Mr. 
Baldwin's,  where  he  found  welcome  and  care.  He  was  soon 
enlisted  in  the  enterprise  of  Berea  Seminary.  He  was  an 
enthusiastic  and  successful  teacher,  and  left  his  impress  upon 
his  students.  Mr.  Baldwin  gave  him  a  house  as  a  wedding 
])resent,  but,  as  this  was  not  conveniently  situated,  he  gave 
him  another. 

Berea  Seminary  was  opened  in  the  fall  of  1840,  and  con- 
tinued about  six  years,  when  it  was  suspended.  Baldwin 
Institute  was  opened  April  9,  1846.  It  was  conducted 
largely  on  the  normal  plans  for  the  training  of  teachers  for 
tlieir  work.  Tlie  attendance  was  large  for  the  time,  fre- 
(jucntly  exceeding  one  hundred,  and  great  good  was  accom- 
plished. 

Baldwin  Institute. 

In  the  spring  of  1844,  John  Baldwin  attended  a  quarterly 
meeting  at  Brighton,  Brooklyn  Circuit,  Norwalk  District,  of 
which  Eev.  Thomas  Thompson  was  the  presiding  elder. 
The  sermon  impressed  Mr.  Baldwin  deeply,  and  at  the  close 
of  tlie  services  he  addressed  Elder  Thompson  thus  :  "  I  have 
been  thinking  about  that  text  and  sermon,  and  it  strikes  me 
you  ought  to  come  to  Berea,  and  I  think  you  will  say  I  am 
not  mistaken  when  you  do."  In  accordance  with  this  invita- 
tion. Elder  Thompson  called  on  Brother  Baldwin  when  on 

his  way  to   his  next  quarterly  meeting,  which  was  held  at 
14 


314  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Brunswick.     I  quote  from  Elder  Thompson's  memorandum, 
which  he  prepared  at  the  request  of  Dr.  W.  C.  Peirce : 

On  arriviug,  I  found  Brother  Baldwin  shearing  sheep,  all  alone  in  a 
brush  pasture  of  some  fifteen  or  more  acres.  He  had  his  fleeces 
spread  just  where  they  were  dropped,  remarking  that  he  believed  in  all 
God's  creatures  enjoying  all  the  liberty  Providence  designed.  He 
therefore,  with  a  lump  of  salt,  caught  one  where  he  could,  stripped  it 
of  its  coat,  and  let  it  go.  He  then  said,  "  Seven  years  ago,  when  the 
community  broke  up,  I  was  $4,000  in  debt,  and  every  body  said, 
'  Baldwin  is  gone  up ; '  but  I  took  the  matter  in  prayer  to  the  Lord, 
and  promised  him,  if  he  would  help  me  out  of  that  difiiculty,  I  would 
give  all  but  mush  and  potatoes  to  the  cause.  Immediately  that  text 
you  preached  from  last  Sabbath  came  into  my  mind,  '  If  any  of  you  lack 
wisdom,  let  him  ask  of  God.'  I  never  went  near  constable,  sheriff,  or 
court.  It  is  true,  they  got  one  farm  from  me,  but  I  got  another  in  its 
place.  I  stuck  to  my  work,  dug  out  one  ton  of  stones  after  another, 
and  paid  off  one  ten  dollars  of  debt  after  another,  till  they  thought  it 
best  to  let  me  alone.  Now  I  am  out  of  debt,  and  have  more  than  I 
need.  I  want  you  to  tell  me  what  to  do  with  it.'  I  asked  him,  '  What 
do  you  wish  to  do  with  it  ? '  He  replied,  '  I  should  like  to  start  a 
school  to  educate  missionaries,  and  give  the  rest  to  support  them  in  the 
field.'  I  replied,  'Give  your  property  for  general  education,  educate  all 
the  youth,  and  the  Lord  will  make  more  missionaries  than  you  can. 
We  need  a  literary  institute  on  the  Reserve.'  " 

Mr.  Baldwin  acted  in  accordance  with  the  suggestion  of 
Elder  Thompson,  and  a  circular  was  sent  out  to  all  the  pre- 
siding elders  of  the  Conference.  Four  out  of  seven  re- 
sponded favorably.  Elder  Eaymond  suggested  the  propriety 
of  calling  a  convention  of  the  preachers  of  the  Conference. 
The  call  was  made,  and  more  than  thirty  preachers  were 
present  at  the  convention  at  which  the  matter  was  dis- 
cussed in  all  its  bearings.  The  result  is  shown  in  the  fol- 
lowing letter,  which  we  find  in  the  records  of  Baldwin 
Institute : 


The  Schools  in  Berea,  Ohio.  315 

MiDDLEBURY,  September  24,  1844. 
To  THE  Ministers  of  the  North  Ohio  Conference  ; 

Very  dear  Brethren  :  Feeling  that  I  am  under  very  deep  obliga- 
tions to  Almighty  God  for  his  mercies,  which  have  followed  me,  through 
the  instrumentality  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  from  my  youth, 
and  believing,  with  the  venerated  Wesley,  that  it  is  the  Christian's  duty 
both  to  get  and  give  all  he  can,  I  have  come  to  the  conclusion  to  devote 
to  the  cause  of  religious  education  and  the  missionary  enterprise  a  cer- 
tain piece  of  land  containing  fifty  acres,  including  grindstone  quarries 
and  water  privileges,  described  below,  on  which  I  hereby  agree  to  erect 
a  building,  to  be  of  brick,  seventy-two  by  thirty-six,  the  plan  of  said 
building  to  be  furnished  and  site  located,  worth  from  $2,500  to  $3,000, 
to  be  finished  in  the  fall  of  1845.  John  Baldwin. 

Notwithstanding  considerable  opposition,  the  Conference 
accepted  Mr.  Baldwin's  proposition.  A  charter  was  grant- 
ed by  the  Legislature  of  Ohio  in  December,  1845.  The 
board  of  trustees  was  organized  January  21,  1846.  Berea 
Seminary  was  suspended,  and  Baldwin  Institute  was  opened, 
April  9th,  with  a  male  and  female  department. 

The  first  faculty  of  the  institute  consisted  of  Rev.  H. 
Dwight,  A.M.,  principal  and  teacher  of  ancient  languages 
and  natural  science;  Alfred  Holbrook,  teacher  of  mathe- 
matics and  English  branches ;  Mrs.  Almena  M.  Dwight,  pre- 
ceptress and  teacher  of  French  and  ornamental  branches ; 
and  Miss  Cornelia  Van  Tyne,  teacher  of  the  primary  depart- 
ment.    Miss  Julia  Sheldon  was  also  preceptress. 

The  first  catalogue  gives  the  number  of  students:  gen- 
tlemen, sixty-one;  ladies,  thirty-nine;  total,  one  hundred. 
Professor  Dwight,  the  first  principal,  died  before  the  close 
of  the  first  year,  and  was  succeeded  by  Alfred  Holbrook,  as 
acting  principal.  The  following  gentlemen  have  also  been 
principals  of  the  institute :  Lorenzo  Warner,  M.D.,  Rev.  O. 
T.  Reeves,  A.B.,  W.  L.  Uarris,  I>,\).,  G.  M.  Barber,  A.  M., 


316  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

and  Alexander  Nelson,  D.D.  The  second  year  of  tlie  in- 
stitute the  students  numbered :  gentlemen,  one  hundred  and 
two ;  ladies,  eightj-seven ;  total,  one  hundred  and  eighty- 
nine.  For  the  year  1854  and  1855  the  catalogue  shows :  gen- 
tlemen, one  hundred  and  thirty-nine;  ladies,  ninety-nine; 
total,  two  hundred  and  thirty-eight.  There  have  been 
twelve  alumni  of  the  institute,  the  first  class  graduating  in 
1850,  and  the  last  in  1855,  when  the  institute  was  changed 
into  Baldwin  University. 

Baldwin  Univeesity. 

The  following  statement  may  be  found  in  the  first  annual 
catalogue  of  Baldwin  University :  "  Considering  that  an 
institution  of  still  higher  grade,  under  the  patronage  of  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  was  needed  in  the  Western 
Reserve,  the  trustees,  acting  under  the  direction  of  the  Con- 
ference, recently  effected  a  change  of  charter,  by  which  uni- 
versity powers  were  secured." 

Rev.  John  Wheeler,  D.D.,  was  the  first  president  of  the 
university.  He  was  assisted  by  eight  professors  and  teach- 
ers, among  whom  we  find  Jeremiah  Tingley,  A.M.,  Rev. 
W.  H.  Barnes,  A.B.,  G.  H.  Hartupee,  A.B.,  Miss  Rosanna 
Baldwin,  A.B. 

In  1858  a  German  department  was  opened,  under  the 
instruction  of  O.  Henning,  Ph.D.  From  1859  this  depart- 
ment was  under  the  charge  of  Rev.  Jacob  Rothweiler.  It 
grew  rapidly,  till,  in  1853,  it  was  organized  as  a  separate 
institution,  with  the  title  of  "German  Wallace  College," 
in  honor  of  Hon.  James  Wallace,  who  donated  the  building 
occupied  by  the  college.  This  college  is  still  in  a  flourish- 
ing condition.  It  furnishes  the  houses  occupied  by  the  pro- 
fessors, controls  a  prosperous  orphan  asylum,  and  in  1881: 


The  Schools  in  Berea,  Ohio.  317 

finished  a  fine  boarding-hall  for  students.  The  relation  be- 
tween Baldwin  University  and  German  Wallace  College  is 
very  intimate — the  university  furnishing  instruction  for  both 
institutions  in  mathematics  and  natural  science,  and  the  col- 
lege in  Greek,  German,  and  French.  Students  in  either 
institution  are  entitled  to  free  tuition  in  the  other.  The 
two  are  virtually  one. 

In  1865  a  College  of  Pharmacy  was  organized,  in  connec- 
tion with  the  university,  for  the  thorough  preparation  of 
dniggists  for  their  business.  L.  S.  McCulloch,  M.D.,  was 
the  soul  of  this  entei-prise.  lie  had  a  large  establishment 
for  the  manufacturing  of  drugs,  in  which  the  students  of 
])harmacy  were  practically  trained.  Dr.  McCulloch's  build- 
ing was  destroyed  by  fire,  but  the  department  was  continued 
for  several  years  and  then  suspended,  chiefly  on  account  of 
the  difficulty  of  securing  suitable  instruction  for  the  students. 
A  Commercial  Department  has  been  sustained  from  the  be- 
ginning. 

In  addition  to  his  original  grant,  Mr.  Baldwin  paid,  for 
many  years,  the  salary  of  one  of  the  professors.  In  the 
winter  of  1867  Mr.  Baldwin  donated  to  the  university  forty 
acres  of  stone  quarry,  worth,  at  least,  $2,000  an  acre.  This 
princely  gift  has  placed  the  institution  on  a  solid  foundation 
— literally,  has  founded  it  upon  a  rock.  lie  has  also  given 
$4,000  to  the  ladies'  hall,  and  a  thousand  acres  of  land  in 
Louisiana.  Dr.  Wheeler  retired  from  the  presidency  in 
1870,  and  was  succeeded  by  Rev.  W.  D.  Godman,  D.D., 
under  whose  administration  the  institution  prospered  for  five 
years. 

In  the  fall  of  1874  a  plan  was  set  on  foot  to  consolidate 
Baldwin  University  with  the  Ohio  Wesleyan  University, 
at  Delaware,  Ohio,  by  transferring  the  control  of  Baldwin 


318  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

University  to  the  trustees  of  the  Ohio  Wesleyan  University. 
Dr.  Godman  was  led  to  favor  this  plan,  which  was  strongly 
urged  by  some  of  the  trustees  of  Baldwin  University,  among 
whom  was  Horace  Benton.  It  was  strongly  opposed  by 
Lyman  Baker  and  other  trustees.  Mr.  Baldwin  was  appealed 
to  by  both  parties.  Among  those  who  advised  Mr.  Baldwin 
against  the  project  were  Rev.  William  Nast,  D.D.,  president 
of  German  Wallace  College,  and  Bishop  Simpson.  I  quote 
from  a  letter  from  Bishop  Simpson  to  Mr.  Baldwin,  dated 
JSTovember  19,  1874 :  "  I  wish  to  say  to  you :  1.  That  I  do 
not  wish  to  advise  you  against  doing  any  thing  for  Dela- 
ware that  you  wish  to  do.  I  wish  it  all  possible  prosperity. 
2.  But  I  could  not  advise  you  to  take  property  once  deeded 
to  Baldwin  away  from  Berea,  for  which  you  had  labored, 
and  to  which  place  people  had  moved  and  bought  property, 
from  the  fact  that  you  had  founded  an  institution  there." 

Mr.  Baldwin  decided  against  the  project,  and  the  scheme 
failed.  Dr.  Godman  resigned  the  presidency  in  the  spring  of 
1875,  and  was  succeeded  by  A.  Schuyler,  LL.D.  In  the 
last  ten  years  an  elegant  stone  building,  worth  at  least  $30,000, 
lias  been  erected  and  furnished,  and  is  now  occupied  by  the 
preceptress  and  the  lady  students. 

The  following  have  been  members  of  the  faculty  of  the 
university  at  various  periods :  Presidents :  John  Wheeler, 
D.D.,  W.  D.  Godman,  D.D.,  and  A.  Schuyler,  LL.D. 
Preceptresses:  Miss  Emily  A.  Covil,  Miss  Bosanna  Bald- 
win, Miss  Mary  A.  Proctor,  Mrs.  W.  C.  Peirce,  Mrs.  J. 
Wheeler,  Mrs.  A.  Schuyler,  Miss  Elizabeth  Hall,  Miss  An- 
gela R.  Houghton,  Miss  Ellen  H.  Warner,  Miss  Clara  Schuy- 
ler, Miss  Anna  M.  Thomson.  Professors:  T.  Tingley, 
A.M.,  W.  H.  Barnes,  A.M.,  G.  H.  Hartupee,  A.M.,  E.  J. 
Cutler,  M.D.,  W.  C.  Peirce,  S.T.D.,  A.  Schuyler,  LL.D.,  J. 


The  Schools  in  Bkrea,  Ohio.  319 

Eothvreiler,  D.D.,  R  B.  Pope,  D.D.,  B.  J.  Hoadley,  A.M., 
P.  AV.  Mosl)lech,  Ph.D.,  M.  J.  Flannerj,  A.M.,  J.  W.  White, 
Ph.D.,  Ellen  IL  Warner,  A.M.,  A.  D.  Knapp,  A.M.,  E. 
Thomson,  D.D.,  Maggie  P.  Safford,  A.M.,  A.  S.  Newton, 
A.M.,  Clara  E.  Schuyler,  A.M.,  C.  Rienieiischneider,  Ph.D., 
D.  Torbet,  A.M.,  Y.  Wilker,  A.M.,  J.  Dodge,  Ph.D.,  William 
Kepler,  Ph.D.,  A.  Mattison,  A.M.  Fine  Arts:  Miss  E.  A. 
Morrison,  Miss  S.  P.  Adams,  Miss  S.  A.  Storer,  Miss  C. 
Adams,  Mrs.  S.  P.  Barnes,  Mrs.  M.  E.  Schneir,  Miss  L. 
M.  Plimpton,  Mrs.  L.  D.  Peirce,  L.  A.  Tuttle,  Miss  M. 
M.  Gardiner,  Mrs.  M.  Flannery,  F.  M.  Davis,  Miss  A. 
McGrangli,  J.  Hart,  Mrs.  Leonard,  Miss  E.  Castle,  J.  Berr, 
Miss  Mattie  Bigelow,  Miss  Mary  Bigelow,  Mrs.  N.  M. 
Watson,  Miss  Cora  E.  Peirce,  Miss  Lena  Davis,  W.  R. 
Grannis.  Pharmacy:  J.  Wheeler,  D.D.,  W.  C.  Peirce, 
S.T.D.,  E.  J.  Cutler,  M.D.,  L.  S.  McCuUough,  M.D., 
M.  V.  B.  Clark,  M.D.,  Mrs.  W.  D.  Godman,  M.D.,  F.  M. 
Coates,  M.D.,  E.  Thomson,  D.D.,  D.  Torbet,  A.M.,  H.  S. 
Frances,  B.S. 

The  alumni  number  as  follows:  In  cursu:  gentlemen, 
one  hundred  and  seventy-nine ;  ladies,  one  hundred  and 
thirteen;  total,  two  hundred  and  ninety-two.  In  honore: 
gentlemen,  thirty-one  ;  ladies,  two  ;  total,  thirty-three.  To- 
tal alumni^  three  hundred  and  twenty-live.  Of  the  alumni 
forty  are  ministers,  ten  physicians,  twenty  lawyers,  fifty 
teachers,  twenty-two  druggists,  fifteen  missionaries,  one  hun- 
dred and  sixty-eight  in  business.  Many  students  wlio  have 
not  graduated  are  now  useful  citizens,  engaged  in  the  activi- 
ties of  life.  AYe  close  with  a  sketch  of  the  life  of  the 
founder,  Hon.  John  Baldwin. 

John  Baldwin,  the  honored  founder  of  Baldwin  University, 
was  born  October  13,  1790,  and  died  December  28,  1884, 


320  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

and  consequently  readied  the  ripe  age  of  eighty-five  years, 
two  months,  and  fifteen  days.  Though  for  several  of  the  last 
years  of  his  life  he  was  feeble  in  body,  yet  he  retained  to  the 
last  the  vigor  of  mind  which  characterized  his  life.  He  had 
ardent  impulses  and  a  strong  will.  His  desire  for  usefulness, 
which  was  the  ruling  passion  of  his  life,  was  manifest  to  tiie 
day  of  his  death.  He  was  ambitious  in  two  respects — to 
promote  religion  and  to  provide  means  for  a  higher  educa- 
tion. These  two  aims  he  combined  in  one,  which  he  styled 
"  Christian  educationP  To  the  promotion  of  Christian 
education  he  devoted  the  energies  of  a  powerful  will  and  a 
long  life. 

Intellectually  and  spiritually  he  was  a  growing  man  to  the 
last.  His  most  intimate  friends  observed,  with  admiration, 
the  increased  liberality  and  breadth  of  view  which  he  mani- 
fested during  the  last  twenty  years  of  his  life.  No  doubt 
this  personal  growth  was,  in  great  measure,  due  to  the  bless- 
ing of  God  resting  upon  him  as  a  reward  of  his  benevolence. 
Father  Baldwin's  success  is  to  be  attributed  to  the  fact  that 
he  has  labored  in  harmony  with  the  will  of  God,  as  that  will 
has  been  made  known  to  him  by  the  indications  of  provi- 
dence. He  prayed  for  direction,  and  when  his  prayers  were 
answered,  as  he  believed  they  would  be,  and  as  he  had  a  riglit 
to  expect,  he  acted  accordingly.  His  early  opportunities  for 
improvement  were  not  favorable  ;  but,  having  a  Strong  thirst 
for  knowledge,  he  applied  himself  with  great  diligence,  in 
spite  of  obstacles  which  to  a  less  energetic  nature  would 
have  seemed  insurmountable.  He  acquired  a  knowledge 
of  English  grammar  while  engaged  in  making  shingles. 
With  his  book  open  before  him  he  would  read  a  sen- 
tence, and  repeat  it  to  the  music  of  the  mallet  and  the 
drawing  knife. 


TiiK  Schools  in  I>ekka,  Ohio.  321 

At  lengtli  liis  stock  of  knowledge  was  sufficient  to  enable 
liim  to  teach  scliool.  It  may  be  mentioned,  as  characteristic 
of  the  man,  that  at  one  time  two  schools  were  offered  him 
— one  in  a  good  neighborhood,  with  advanced  scholars  and 
good  wages,  and  the  other  in  an  obscure  neighborhood,  with 
rough,  backward  scholars,  and  much  lower  wages.  In  ac- 
cordance wnth  his  predilection  for  missionary  work,  lie  chose 
the  latter  as  a  field  affording  greater  opportunities  for  use- 
fulness. His  choice  wa^  wise.  His  religious  zeal  was  blessed 
in  the  conversion  of  a  large  number  of  his  scholars.  After 
spending  five  years  in  teaching  he  married  a  wife  who  has 
proved  a  helpmate  for  him.  He  removed  to  Berea  in  1828, 
and  with  two  othei*8,  projected  a  community  in  which,  as  with 
the  early  Christians,  all  things  should  be  common.  The  plan 
failed,  as  a  matter  of  course,  and  left  Mr.  Baldwin  deeply 
in  debt,  but  rich  iii  experience.  As  a  man  of  fiiith  and 
pi-ayer  he  applied  to  God  for  relief.  He  asked  for  w^isdom, 
and  obtained  it.  The  value  of  the  stone  underlying  Berea 
was  impressed  on  his  mind,  and  he  saw  in  this  a  means,  not 
only  of  relieving  himself  from  the  burden  of  debt,  but  of 
making  himself  greatly  useful.  He  consecrated  himself  anew 
to  God,  and  vowed  to  devote  his  property  to  the  work  of  the 
Church.  Nor  did  he  forget  his  vow  when  prosperity  again 
smiled  upon  him. 

After  consultation  with  Rev.  Thomas  Thompson,  he  re- 
solved to  devote  his  property  to  the  higher  education  of  the 
young  people  of  the  Church,  especially  in  view  of  preparing 
missionaries  for  work  in  heathen  lands.  He  offered  a  valu- 
able property  to  the  North  Ohio  Conference,  which  was  ac- 
cepted, and  the  school  duly  opened,  in  1846,  under  the  name 
of  Baldwin  Institute.     It  may  be  remarked  that  this  was  not 

the  name  chosen  bv  Mr.  Baldwin.     He  proposed   "  Kings- 
14*  "  •      ^ 


322  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

wood  Institute,"  in  imitation  of  Mr.  Wesley's  school ;  but  in 
this  he  was  overruled  by  his  friends. 

At  this  time,  as  might  be  expected,  Mr.  Baldwin  was  full 
of  his  plans  for  Christian  education.  As  out  of  the  abun- 
dance of  the  heart  the  mouth  speaketh,  we  may  know  wliat 
was  in  Mr.  Baldwin's  heart  b}^  knowing  that  his  constant 
themes  were  salvation,  full  and  free ;  Christian  education  for 
the  young  people ;  and  the  salvation  of  the  heathen  through 
the  agency  of  missionary  effort. 

It  may  safely  be  said  that  the  school  he  has  founded 
has  not  disappointed  his  expectations.  God's  work,  in 
all  its  freedom,  fullness,  and  power,  has  steadily  gone 
forward  in  Baldwin  University.  More  than  twent}^  of  its 
students  are  now  missionaries  in  foreign  lands,  fifteen  of 
these  being  alumni.  From  Baldwin  University  has  sprung 
German  Wallace  College,  so  important  to  German  Method- 
ism. The  two  are  virtually  one,  and  one  of  considerable 
strength. 

In  1854  Abel  Stevens,  the  renowned  historian  of  Method- 
ism, in  a  steam-boat  trip  on  the  lakes  met  with  Mr.  Baldwin, 
of  whom  he  gives  a  graphic  account  in  the  "National  Maga- 
zine," of  which  he  was  editor.     He  says : 

We  were  hardly  on  board  when  ray  friend  introduced  me  to  a  pas- 
senger who  I  saw  at  a  glance  was  a  character.  He  wore  a  hat  that  cer- 
tainly had  not  been  brushed  for  six  months,  and  it  might  have  been  as 
many  years  old;  it  was  high,  and,  falling  slightly  aback,  disclosed  as 
genuine  a  Yankee  contour  as  ever  the  "London  Punch"  or  "Yankee 
Notion  "  portrayed — that  prominence  of  the  nas.il  region,  those  lines 
radiating  from  the  eyes  and  extending  to  the  ears,  those  thin  but  tough 
integuments,  and  that  indescribable  expression  of  easy  self-possession, 
of  mingled  "cuteness"  and  good  humor,  which  have  become  the  moral 
and  physiognomical  characteristics  of  Brother  Jonathan  the  world  over. 
His  shoes  were  rough,  heavy  clumps  of  leather,  that  certainly  had  never 


TnE  Schools  in  Berea,  Ohio.  323 

known  blacking;  his  coat  and  pantaloons  were  black  woolen  of  the 
coarsest,  strongest  texture;  his  shirt-bosom  and  collar  were  unstarched, 
coarse  cotton,  and  he  wore  no  stock.  He  evidently  did  not  relish  the 
delectation  of  shaving,  and  his  speech  was  the  very  perfection  of  nasal 
drawl;  yet  there  was  something  exceedingly  interesting  about  him.  He 
announced  himself  tp  me,  when  introduced,  as  a  Yankee  of  the  seventh 
distillation ;  he  seemed  to  be  conscious  of  his  appearance,  and  to  enjoy 
the  practical  joke  it  was  playing  upon  the  world.  For,  after  all,  he 
stood  before  me  a  genuine  man — a  man  who  had  nobly  fought  with 
misfortune,  and  had  won  the  day;  a  man  who  is  religiously  upright, 
whose  energies  are  expended  in  doing  good  in  the  noblest  way, 
by  promoting  education  and  virtue ;  whose  name  is  on  an  important 
institution  of  the  West;  and  who  was  now  actually  on  his  way  to  the 
Chippewa  camp-meeting  to  obtain  two  or  three  young  Indians  whom  he 
wished  to  educate  at  his  own  expense  for  the  benefit  of  their  race.  .  .  . 
God  bless  you,  John  Baldwin,  with  your  big  heart  and  generous  deeds  I 

The  friends  of  Mr.  Baldwin  will  recognize  the  correctness 
of  the  portrait. 

In  this  sketch  we  should  not  fail  to  mention  his  work  in 
the  South.  At  the  close  of  the  civil  war  he  became  deeply 
interested  in  the  educational  wants  of  the  South.  Ilis  let- 
ter to  Dr.  Newman,  then  at  New  Orleans,  will  explain 
itself :  '•  I  have  bought  the  Darby  plantation  of  seventeen 
liundred  acres,  in  St.  Mary's  Parish,  La.,  live  miles  above 
Franklin,  on  the  Teche,  for  $20,000.  I  have  deposited  the 
money  in  the  bank,  and  sent  my  son  to  perfect  the  title. 
There  is  a  fine  site  of  thirty  or  forty  acres  on  the  banks 
of  the  river,  comprising  some  fifteen  or  twenty  buildings 
which  the  brethren  of  the  Mississippi  Mission  Confer- 
ence can  occupy  for  religious  education  as  soon  as  they 
choose,  provided  no  distmction  is  made  on  account  of  sex  or 
color." 

Mr.  Baldwin,  however,  learned  from  experience  that  it  is 
better  to  keep  the  races  apart,  in  the  work  of  education.    His 


324  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

school  in  the  South,  at  Baldwin,  La.,  is  now  open  only  to 
white  young  people.  This  is  well  enough,  as  a  school  for 
colored  people  is  now  open  in  the  same  place,  and  is  flourish- 
ing under  the  care  of  Dr.  Godinan. 

For  the  last  seventeen  years  Father  Baldwin  has  passed  fre- 
quently from  North  to  South,  and  back  again.  This  habit 
has  enabled  him  to  avoid  tlie  extremes  of  climate,  and  prob- 
ably has  had  a  beneficial  influence  upon  his  health,  and  has, 
no  doubt,  in  the  providence  of  God,  aided  in  prolonging  his 
life  to  such  a  good  old  age.  Father  Baldwin  died  in  the 
faith  in  which  he  lived ;  but  he  has  left  a  name  that  will 
never  die.  He  rests  from  his  labors,  and  his  works  follow 
him.  He  will  receive  his  rewai'd  at  the  resurrection  of  the 
just. 


The  East  Greenwich  Academy.  325 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

THE  EAST  GREENWICH  ACADEMY. 

BY   PROFESSOR  0.  W.  SCOTT. 

This  institution  takes  its  name  from  the  village  in  which 
it  is  located.  East  Greenwich  is  fourteen  miles  from  Provi- 
dence, R.  I.,  and  fifty-six  from  Boston ;  beautifully  situated 
on  the  western  shore  of  Karragansett  Bay.  The  academy 
buildings  crown  a  hill  which  rises  above  the  village,  giving 
the  advantage  of  a  partial  isolation,  and  are  surrounded  by 
well-kept  and  extensive  grounds.  From  the  observatory 
may  be  seen  the  cities  of  Providence,  Fall  River,  Warren, 
Bristol,  and  Newport ;  while  a  nearer  view  embraces  forests 
and  fields,  gardens  and  beautiful  homes,  and  the  sparkling 
waters  of  the  bay,  with  white  sails  passing  to  and  fro.  When 
we  consider  the  acknowledged  healthfulness  of  this  section 
of  country  we  can  but  see  that  Nature  has  given  every  possi- 
ble advantage. 

In  looking  up  the  history  of  this  school  we  are  led  to  con- 
sult a  work  prepared  by  Dr.  Daniel  Greene,  covering 
the  history  of  the  town  from  1677  to  1877 — two  centuries. 
In  October,  1802,  a  few  individuals  procured  a  charter 
of  incorporation  from  the  General  Assembly  "  for  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  classical  school  to  be  called  Kent  Academy," 
taking  this  name,  Kent,  from  that  of  the  county.  This 
proved  to  be  the  first  successful  school  of  high  order  in  the 
State. 

The  preamble  and  articles  of  association  were  drawn  up 
by  Hon.  Ray  Greene,  and  indicate  a  wise  foresight  and  a 


326  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

liigli  appreciation  of  Christian  education.  The  eight  men 
express  themselves  "  anxious  to  promote  the  happiness  of 
posterity,  and  to  continue  the  blessings  of  a  free  and  equal 
government ;  "  and  also  quaintly  express  themselves  as  hoping 
"  that  such  an  institution  will  be  productive  of  the  advantage 
to  East  Greenwich  and  its  vicinity  of  introducing  a  settled 
minister  of  the  Gospel  to  preach  in  the  meeting-house,  which 
is  now  so  seldom  improved."  Thus  we  see  tliat  at  the  be- 
ginning of  the  century,  "education  was  the  handmaid  of 
religion." 

The  association  purchased  a  lot  containing  "  one  acre  and 
twenty  rods,"  and  soon  erected  upon  it  a  building  "  about 
sixty  feet  long,  and  thirty  feet  wide,  and  two  stories  high." 
In  August,  1804,  it  was  found  to  have  cost  $3,733  65,  the 
entire  expense  being  divided  into  one  hundred  shares,  taken 
originally  by  about  sixty  subscribers.  Governor  William 
Greene  was  the  first  president  of  the  board  of  trustees,  and 
Eichard  Mathewson  and  Stephen  Arnold  were  "principal 
agents,"  while  the  committee  in  charge  of  the  building  in- 
terests were  William  Greene,  Wanton  Casey,  and  William 
Greene  Spencer.  Concerning  the  furnishing  of  the  new 
academy  we  give  the  following  extract  from  the  record  of 
1804:  "The  maps  and  globes  were  splendid  articles,  and 
were  imported  from  Europe.  The  maps  were  on  a  large 
scale,  four  by  five  feet,  and  elegantly  mounted,  and  the 
twenty-four-inch  globes  were  the  best  that  could  be  pro- 
cured." 

The  first  curriculum  was  very  unpretentious,  and  is  now 
quite  a  curiosity.  The  following  is  taken  from  the  records 
of  the  board  of  trustees  in  the  year  1808  : 

''  Besolved^  That  the  following  be  rates  of  tuition  for  the 
quarter  commencing  the  21st  of  March,  1808: 


The  East  Greenwich  Academy.  327 

Reading  and  Spelling $2  00 

Reading,  Writing,  and  Spelling  2  25 

Arithmetic,  with  Book-keeping 2  50 

English  Grammar 3  00 

Composition  and  Speaking 3  00 

Latin  and  Greek  Languages 3  00 

Logic  and  Criticism 3  00 

The  principles  of  Astronomy  and  Geography,  with  the  use  of  globes 3  50 

The  fifty  cents  additional  in  the  last  item  was  for  the  use 
of  the  globes!  Comparing  the  above  with  the  present 
courses  of  study,  we  get  an  idea  of  the  progress  made  in 
passing  years. 

The  first  principal  of  the  academy  was  Abner  Alden,  A.M. 
lie  was  an  excellent  teacher,  and  conducted  the  school  suc- 
cessfully for  several  years.  He  was  succeeded  by  Joseph  L. 
Tillinghast,  and  he,  in  rapid  succession,  by  Aaron  Putnam, 
Ezekiel  Kich,  A.M.,  James  Underwood,  A.M.,  Eev.  Daniel 
Waldo,  A.M.,  who  died  at  the  age  of  one  hundred  and  four; 
Benjamin  F.  Allen,  A.M.,  Nathan  Whiting,  A.M.,  Charles  II. 
Alden,  A.M.,  Eev.  Ebenezer  Coleman,  A.M.,  Christopher  Eob- 
inson,  A.M.,  lie  v.  Henry  Edes,  A.M.,  Penuel  Corbett,  A.M., 
George  W.  Greene,  A.M.,  Joseph  Harrington,  A.M.,  Joshua 
().  Coburn,  A.M.,  and  Thomas  P.  Rodman,  A.M.  This  brings 
us  to  the  year  1836,  about  which  time  an  effort  was  made  to 
establish  a  school  of  higher  grade,  under  the  patronage  of  the 
Methodist  Society,  but,  failing  in  this,  the  academy  passed 
into  other  hands.  From  1836  to  1839  Joshua  O.  Coburn  (the 
second  term)  and  Rev.  James  Richardson  served  as  prin- 
cipals. In  1839  the  institution  was  sold  to  Rev.  Daniel  G. 
Allen,  an  alumnus  of  Middletown  College.  For  two  yeai*s 
lie  conducted  a  very  prosperous  school,  and  then,  in  1841,  he 
sold  the  establishment  to  the  Providence  Conference  of  the 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 


328  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

It  is  well  to  notice,  at  the  close  of  this  first  era,  that  dur- 
ing all  those  early  years,  and  while  laboring  under  the  dis- 
advantage of  a  constant  change  of  teachers,  this  school 
"  maintained  its  first  principles,"  always  calling  to  its  aid 
men  of  culture  and  piety.  It  did  much  toward  supplying  tlie 
State  witli  leaders,  from  governor  down  through  the  profes- 
sions to  the  teachers  in  the  common  schools,  thus  earning,  by 
its  faithful  formative  work,  a  place  for  old  *'  Kent  Academy  " 
in  the  annals  of  history. 

After  the  school  became  the  property  of  the  Providence 
Conference  a  new  charter  was  obtained  from  the  Legislature, 
and  its  name  was  changed  to  "  Providence  Conference  Sem- 
inary," and  Kev.  B.  F.  Tefft,  A.M.,  was  appointed  principal, 
with  Daniel  G.  Allen  and  Joshua  Newhall  assistants,  and 
Miss  Lavinia  Livermore  preceptress.  The  appointment  of 
Dr.  Tefft  gave  great  satisfaction  to  Khode  Island  Methodists, 
and  his  administration  was  marked  by  increased  patronage, 
an  improved  course  of  study,  and  most  encouraging  pros- 
pects. But  he  was  sought  as  a  preacher  by  various  churches, 
and  at  the  end  of  one  year  he  resigned  his  position  to  take 
charge  of  one  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  churches  in  Bos- 
ton, Mass. 

Kev.  G.  F.  Poole  was  appointed  to  the  vacancy,  but  the 
school  did  not  prosper  as  its  friends  had  hoped  and  expected, 
and  at  the  end  of  the  year  the  trustees  leased  the  seminary 
to  Rev.  Daniel  G.  Allen,  who  again  called  Mr.  Newhall  to 
his  assistance.  As  Professor  Allen  had  previously  owned 
the  institution  and  successfully  presided  over  it,  the  trustees 
looked  for  increased  prosperity  ;  but  at  the  expiration  of  one 
year  Professor  Allen  resigned,  in  order  to  take  charge  of  his 
farm  in  the  neighborhood.  Professor  Allen  was  succeeded, 
in  1844:,  by  Be  v.  George  B.  Cone,  A.M.,  a  graduate  of  Wes- 


The  East  Greenwich  Academy.  329 

leyan  University,  class  of  1837.  He  liad  been  occnpied  in 
teaching  since  leaving  the  university,  and  brought  to  the 
seminary  qualities  which  insured  a  successful  administration. 
As  the  number  of  students  increased  from  term  to  term,  and 
it  became  difficult  to  procure  suitable  accommodations,  it  was 
decided  to  erect  a  boarding-house.  This  building  was  three 
stories  in  height,  and  of  sufficient  dimensions  to  accommodate 
about  one  hundred  students.  The  boarding  pupils,  from 
this  date,  came  under  the  care  and  supervision  of  the 
teachers. 

After  serving  the  school  most  acceptably  in  all  its  depart- 
ments, in  1847  Professor  Cone  received  a  call  to  take  charge 
of  a  school  in  Georgia,  which  he  accepted,  and  Rev.  William 
Bagnall,  A.M.,  was  elected  principal.  True  to  the  "  itiner- 
ancy," however,  he  resigned  after  one  year,  and  returned  to 
pastoral  work,  but  finally  settled  down  to  literary  labor  in 
New  York  city.  Rev.  Robert  Allyn,  A.M.  (afterward 
D.D.,  LL.D.),  became  principal  in  1848.  Professor  Allyn's 
success  as  a  teacher,  both  before  and  after  his  graduation  at 
Wesleyan  University  in  1841,  had  been  such  as  to  inspire  the 
friends  of  the  seminary  with  high  hopes,  and  grandly  did  he 
meet  all  expectations.  He  was  supported  by  a  generous 
board  of  trustees,  an  able  corps  of  teachers,  and  a  large  at- 
tendance of  students.  This  prosperous  condition  continued 
throughout  the  six  years  he  was  connected  with  the  seminary, 
all  departments  feeling  the  influence  of  his  master-hand. 
Dr.  AUyn's  ability  was  recognized  outside  of  the  school,  and 
for  two  years,  while  he  was  principal,  he  represented  the 
town  in  the  State  Legislature.  But  when,  in  1854,  he  ac- 
cepted the  office  of  commissioner  of  public  schools  for  the 
State  of  Rhode  Island,  he  resigned  his  position.  His  suc- 
cessor was  Rev.  George  W.  Quereau,  A.M.,  another  alumnus 


330  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

of  Wesleyan  University.  He  had  been  an  assistant  principal 
in  tlic  seminary  for  two  years  previous,  and  hence  was  ac- 
quainted with  its  plans  and  methods,  and  the  school  continued 
to  prosper  under  his  leadership.  During  Professor  Allyn's 
administration  the  necessity  of  a  new  academic  building  had 
become  so  apparent  that  he  had  interested  himself  in  plan- 
ning for  its  erection.  Professor  Quereau,  with  the  trustee!^, 
took  up  the  work  so  successfully,  that  in  the  summer  of  185S 
the  new  building  was  completed  and  dedicated,  after  which 
Professor  Quereau  resigned  his  office,  to  which  Bev.  Micah 
J.  Talbot  was  elected.  At  this  period  few  schools  in  the  coun- 
try possessed  a  finer  equipment  than  this.  The  new  edifice, 
costing  more  than  $20,000,  w^as  of  brick,  large  and  elegant  in 
its  proportions,  and  containing  ample  recitation  rooms,  office, 
library,  reading-room,  cabinet,  principal's  room,  and  one  of 
the  finest  seminary  chapels  in  New  England.  In  1859  the 
services  of  Professor  Eben  Tourjee,  who  has  since  gained  a 
world-wide  reputation,  were  secured  as  musical  director ;  and 
as  the  facilities  for  obtaining  a  musical  education  were  thus 
greatly  enlarged,  the  name  of  the  school  became,  by  legisla- 
tive act,  "  Providence  Conference  Seminary  and  Musical  In- 
stitute," thus  giving  to  the  school  the  honor  of  opening  the 
first  conservatory  of  music  in  America. 

Although  Professor  Tourjee  was  called  to  a  broader  field, 
the  impetus  he  gave  to  this  science  is  still  seen  in  the  unusu- 
ally fine  advantages  offered  to  students. 

In  1862  Eev.  B.  D.  Ames,  an  alurrmus  of  Middlebury 
College,  took  charge  of  the  seminary,  acting  as  principal 
with  good  success  until  1864,  when  Rev.  James  T.  Edwards 
was  elected  to  that  office.  He  served  six  years,  and  during 
this  period  the  general  prosperity  of  the  school  continued. 
Dr.  Edwards  served  as  a  member  of  the  State  Senate  three 


The  East  Greenwich  Academy.  331 

years,  and  became  well-known  as  a  popular  educator  and  cit- 
izen. When,  in  1870,  he  became  president  of  the  Chamber- 
lain Institute,  within  the  bounds  of  the  Erie  Conference, 
Rev.  David  H.  Ela  was  elected  to  fill  his  place.  In  1871  a 
class  numbering  twenty  was  graduated,  the  largest  that  had 
ever  left  the  institution.  In  1873  Professor  Ela  returned  to 
pastoral  work  in  the  New  England  Conference,  and  Eev. 
Francis  D.  Blakeslee  became  his  successor.  At  this  time  the 
seminary  passed  somewhat  under  the  control  of  the  trustees 
of  the  Boston  University,  and  assumed  the  character  of  a 
preparatory  school  for  that  institution.  For  two  years  this 
arrangement  continued,  but  not  meeting  the  expectation  of 
either  party,  the  connection  was  dissolved  by  mutual  agree- 
ment, Professor  Blakeslee  being  retained  as  principal  of  the 
seminary.  For  eleven  years,  in  all.  Professor  Blakeslee  held 
the  position,  this  being  the  longest  period,  by  far,  that  it  was 
held  by  one  man.  He  was  popular  and  beloved  by  his  stu- 
dents, and  during  the  years  of  his  administration  there  was 
a  constantly  increasing  attendance,  and  the  classes  which  were 
graduated  compared  most  favorably  with  those  from  similar 
institutions  throughout  the  country.  But  for  a  number  of 
years  preceding  and  during  this  period  the  school  had  been 
burdened  with  debt.  As  the  years  passed,  instead  of  being 
diminished,  this  increased,  as  repairs  were  made  or  additional 
expenses  in  other  directions  incurred,  until  tlie  friends  of  the 
seminary  became  greatly  discouraged  and  alarmed  as  to  its 
future. 

Owing  to  these  circumstances,  in  1884  the  school  passed, 
by  purchase,  into  the  hands  of  a  stock  company,  whose  offi- 
cers are  as  follows :  Smith  S.  Talcott,  president ;  Rev. 
Henry  D.  Robinson,  vice-president ;  Rev.  Henry  W.  Conant, 
secretary ;  Rev.  W.  M'Kendree  Bray,  treasurer  and  financial 


Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

agent.  This  company  assumed  the  debt,  and  elected  the 
Rev.  Oliver  H.  Fernald  principal  of  the  school,  the  name 
of  which  was  changed,  by  legislative  act,  to  "The  East 
Greenwich  Academy." 

During  that  academic  year  the  financial  prospects  so  im- 
proved as  to  give  great  promise  of  increased  usefulness. 
The  total  number  of  students  was  five  hundred  and  ninety- 
five.  In  July,  1885,  Professor  Fernald  resigned,  and  Rev. 
Orange  W.  Scott,  then  pastor  of  Centenary  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church,  Binghamton,  N.  Y.,  was  elected  his  suc- 
cessor. Aside  from  this  change  there  were  but  two  others 
in  the  board  of  instniction.  The  faculty,  as  it  now  stands 
(1886),  is  as  follows :  Rev.  O.  W.  Scott,  principal ;  Rev.  Wm. 
Rice  Newhall,  A.M.,  Frank  E.  Hathorne,  John  B.  Hambly, 
George  W.  Ehler,  C.E.,  Prentis  S.  Daniels ;  Miss  Mary  F. 
Redington,  preceptress ;  Mrs.  May  E.  Newhall,  M.E.L., 
Miss  Josie  E.  Reynolds,  Miss  Helen  A.  Partridge,  Mrs.  Ma- 
bel D.  Hathorne,  Miss  F.  Y.  Russell ;  John  McLeod,  steward ; 
George  B.  P.  Hudson,  librarian ;  Mrs.  M.  A.  Schoonover, 
matron. 

It  is  believed  that  this  list  of  teachers  will  compare  fiivor- 
ably  with  that  of  any  similar  institution.  There  are  now 
^ve  regular  courses  of  study,  namely :  college  preparatory, 
Latin  scientific,  scientific,  academic,  industrial  science.  Be- 
sides tliese  there  is  English  preparatory,  one  year,  for  thor- 
ough drill  in  the  English  branches. 

The  institution  awards  eight  diplomas.  Another  feature 
worthy  of  mention  is  the  kindergarten  department,  under 
the  Froebclian  method,  for  cliildren  under  seven  years  of 
age.  Elocution  is  also  made  something  of  a  specialty,  under 
a  competent  instructor. 

Instead  of  the  "  one  acre  and  twenty  rods  "  first  purchased, 


The  East  Greenwich  Academy.  333 

tlie  grounds  now  contain  five  acres,  divided  into  play-grounds 
and  lawn,  well  cared  for  and  beautifully  shaded.  Upon  these 
grounds  stand  the  boarding-hall,  the  academy,  and  the 
"Winsor  House,"  where  the  principal  and  several  other 
teachers  live.  The  boarding-hall  is  supplied  with  hot  and 
cold  water  and  bath-rooms,  while  all  the  buildings  are  warmed 
with  steam  and  lighted  with  gas.  The  institution  has  a  good 
philosophical  and  chemical  apparatus,  a  stereopticon,  electric 
machine,  etc.  The  reading-room  is  well  supplied  with  valu- 
able papers  and  periodicals— daily,  weekly,  and  monthly — 
from  different  parts  of  the  country. 

There  are  three  literary  societies  connected  with  the  acad- 
emy, two  for  gentlemen  and  one  for  ladies.  As  has  always 
been  the  aim  of  the  institution,  the  government  is  mild  yet 
firm,  and  such  as  to  aid  students  in  developing  self-govern- 
nient,  without  which  all  other  is  insufiScient.  One  other 
fact  should  be  emphasized,  namely,  the  decided  religious  in- 
fluence exerted  upon  all  who  enter  the  scliool  for  instruction. 
Recognizing  that  "  the  fear  of  the  Lord  is  the  heginnhvg  of 
wisdom,"  earnest  efforts  are  made  to  inculcate  correct  moral 
sentiments,  to  raise  the  standard  of  action,  and  lead  to  a  gen- 
uine Christian  experience. 

In  these  days,  when  the  Bible  is  being  driven  from  our 
public  schools,  and  there  is  a  tendency  to  undervalue  "  foun- 
dation principles,"  it  must  be  gratifying  to  Christian  parents 
that  they  may  place  their  children  in  an  institution  where 
education  is  not  altogether  secular. 

We  can  hardly  close  this  brief  history  without  special  ref- 
erence to  those  who  have  gone  out  from  this  institution  to 
places  of  honor  in  the  world.  Among  those  who  have  taught 
here  and  been  called  to  higher  positions  in  educational  work, 
may  be  specially  mentioned  Dr.  Tefft,  who  became  educator, 


334  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

pastor,  consul,  and  editor  in  due  course  of  time  ;  Dr.  Allyn, 
Dr.  Torsey,  who  had  charge  of  the  commercial  department  of 
this  school,  and  afterward  became  the  distinguished  principal 
of  the  Maine  Conference  Seminary  ;  Professor  Tourjee,  now 
at  the  head  of  the  Boston  Conservatory  of  Music ;  and  Dr. 
Edwards,  of  the  Chamberlain  Institute.  Among  others  who 
were  students  or  members  of  the  alumni^  may  be  named 
Dr.  W.  F.  Warren,  president  of  Boston  University  ;  Bishop 
W.  F.  Mallalieu ;  Dr. -Charles  F.  Payne,  president  of  the  Ohio 
"Wesleyan  University  ;  Dr.  S.  F.  Upham,  Dr.  W.  F.  Hatfield, 
Eev.  William  T.  Worth,  of  Boston,  Rev.  I.  J.  Lansing,  of 
Brooklyn,  and  many  other  ministers  in  the  Methodist  Episco- 
pal Church.  But  the  pulpit  has  by  no  means  absorbed  all  the 
talent  here  developed.  Graduates  of  this  school  have  been 
well-known  in  public  life,  such  names  as  that  of  Senator  An- 
thony being  conspicuous.  Representatives,  judges,  lawyers, 
physicians,  and  teachers  by  the  score  may  be  found  whose 
names  appear  in  the  "  catalogues  "  issued  year  by  year.  Many 
of  them  still  remember  their  alma  mater^  and  as  they  meet 
young  people,  hesitating  as  to  a  future  course  of  study,  di- 
rect them  to  the  halls  where  they  found  helpful  instruction 
in  by-gone  days.  This  kindly  interest  is  greatly  appreciated 
by  those  now  in  charge  of  the  school.  To  those  waiting  for 
an  opportunity  of  doing  more  for  the  institution  we  will 
say  that  the  library  shelves  are  waiting  to  be  filled  with  good 
hooTcs  suited  to  the  demands  of  the  students.  The  "  Con- 
gressional documents,"  now  occupying  considerable  space, 
are  not  read  with  avidity  by  the  present  generation  !  But  if 
these  could  be  supplemented  by  the  best  productions  of  mod- 
ern (or  ancient)  thought,  many  a  mind  would  be  directed  and 
strengthened  which  must  now  wait  for  the  hoolcs  until  the 
time  to  enjoy  them  is  past.     It  would  seem  that  this,  and 


The  East  Greenwich  Academy.  335 

every  school,  should  at  least  possess  the  works  issued  by  its 
own  ahtmnL     "  A  word  to  the  wise  is  sufficient." 

In  closing  we  would  say,  that  the  present  outlook  of  this 
honored  institution  is  very  promising.  Its  financial  interests 
are  in  the  hands  of  competent  Christian  gentlemen,  who 
have  determined  to  place  it  where  it  can  do  the  best  work  for 
God  and  humanity  ;  and  the  corps  of  teachers  in  their  em- 
ploy are  such  as  can  and  will  develop  all  the  resources  at 
their  command  for  the  best  good  of  those  under  their  in- 
struction. 

AVith  the  liberal  patronage  and  support  of  the  Church 
most  deeply  interested,  there  will  surely  be  a  new  era  of 
prosperity  in  the  years  to  come ;  and  we  look  to  see  this 
school  celebrate  its  one  hundredth'  anniversary  in  the  not  re- 
mote future  with  the  descendants  of  those  who  founded  old 
"  Kent  Academy,"  and  a  multitude  of  later  friends,  amid 
well-earned  congratulations  and  songs  of  praise  and  victory. 


336  Eably  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTER  XX. 

OHIO     WESLEYAN      UNIVERSITY. 

BY   REV.  PROFESSOR  WILLIAM   G.   WILLIAMS,  LL.D. 

This  largest  and  most  successful  school  in  the  Methodist 
Episcojjal  Church  is  located  at  the  famous  White  Sulphur 
Springs,  in  the  beautiful  central  city  of  Delaware,  O.  With 
the  hope  of  providing  a  Saratoga  in  the  West,  in  the  year 
1833  two  enterprising  citizens,  Thomas  W.  Powell  and  Co- 
lumbus W.  Kent,  erected,  on  a  lot  of  ten  acres,  an  elegant 
structure,  at  an  expense  of  about  $25,000,  including  cost  of 
ground.  This  was  opened  as  a  hotel,  under  the  name  of  the 
Mansion  House.  This  fine  property  was,  in  the  year  1841, 
transferred  by  Mr.  Powell,  who  had  become  the  sole  propri- 
etor, to  a  board  of  trustees,  in  trust  for  educational  purposes, 
under  the  joint  control  of  the  Ohio  and  North  Ohio  Confer- 
ences of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  By  subsequent 
purchases  the  college  campus  was  increased  to  about  twenty- 
five  acres,  not  including  the  grounds  of  Monnett  Hall.  A 
special  charter,  conferring  university  powers,  was  granted 
by  the  Legislature  in  March,  1842.  This  charter  was  so 
amended  as  to  give  the  control,  through  a  board  of  twenty- 
one  trustees,  to  the  four  Ohio  Conferences,  instead  of  the  two 
which  covered  the  whole  territory  when  the  first  charter  was 
obtained.  At  the  first  meeting  of  the  board  of  trustees  the 
Rev.  Edward  Thomson,  M.D.,  was  elected  president  of  the 
university,  with  the  understanding  that  the  appointment  was 
for  tlie  time  but  nominal,  as  the  college  was  not  yet  pre- 
pared  to  open  its  doors.     A  preparatory  school  was  but  in 


Ohio  Wesleyan  University.  337 

operation,  under  the  able  management  of  Rev.  Solomon 
Howard,  A.M. 

The  university  opened  November  13,  1844,  with  the  fol- 
lowing board  of  instruction :  Rev.  Edward  Thomson,  M.D., 
president ;  Rev.  Herman  M.  Johnson,  A.M.,  professor  of 
ancient  languages ;  Rev.  Solomon  Howard,  A.M.,  professor 
of  mathematics  ;  William  G.  Williams,  A.B.,  principal  of  the 
preparatory  department ;  Enoch  G.  Dial,  assistant  in  the  pre- 
paratory department.  Dr.  Thomson  was  detained  by  other 
duties  from  entering  upon  duty  in  the  university  for  nearly 
two  years.  But  twenty-nine  students  presented  themselves 
for  enrollment  in  the  college.  After  examination,  these 
were  assigned  to  the  freshman,  sophomore,  and  junior  classes, 
giving  the  professors  full  work,  though  their  classes  were 
small.  At  the  opening  only  males  were  admitted  to  the 
privileges  of  the  university. 

The  salaries  paid,  or  rather  promised,  the  faculty,  were 
gauged  by  the  resources  which  the  board  hoped  to  have  at 
their  command  by  the  end  of  the  year.  The  president's  sal- 
ary was  Hxed  at  $800  ;  the  professoi-s  were  to  be  paid  $600 
each,  and  the  teachers  in  the  preparatory  department  $400 
and  $350  respectively ;  but  it  was  many  years  before  even 
these  meager  salaries  were  paid  as  they  became  due. 

The  increase  in  the  number  of  students  was  quite  as  rapid 

as  was  desirable  with  the  limited  means  of  the  university  to 

support   a   sufficient   number   of   teachers.     The    catalogue 

enrollment  for  the  first  year  was  one  hundred  and  ten ;  for 

the  year  1850  it  was  two  hundred  and  fifty-seven ;  the  next 

year  showed  five  hundred  and  six  names  on  the  books.     This 

sudden  increase  was  due  to  the  system  of  cheap  scholarships 

tliat  year  put   into  successful   operation.      Four  thousand 

scholarships  were  sold;  by  this  measure  the  income  of  the 
15 


338  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

school  and  attendance  of  students  were  greatly  increased. 
These  scholarships  are  still  held  by  thousands  of  families. 
The  result  is  a  large  attendance.  At  no  time,  not  even  dur- 
ing the  dark  days  of  the  Rebellion,  has  the  enrollment  gone 
as  low  as  before  the  inauguration  of  the  system. 

The  number  of  teachers  was  from  the  first  too  small  for 
the  work  imposed  on  them.  The  increase  in  number  of  stu- 
dents necessarily  brought  increase  in  the  faculty.  The  aca- 
demic course,  a  few  generations  ago,  embraced  but  little 
more  than  the  languages  and  mathematics.  In  our  century, 
the  marvelous  development  of  natural  science  has  opened  a 
much  wider  field  ;  and  the  modern  colleges  have  recognized 
the  rightful  place  of  these  subjects  as  a  part  of  the  academic 
curriculum. 

In  the  faculty  of  the  Oliio  Wesleyan  University  tliere 
has  been  a  remarkable  permanence.  There  have  been 
but  three  presidents.  Edward  Thomson,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  the 
first  president,  was  by  birth  an  Englishman,  but  by  growth 
and  education  an  American.  He  received  a  good  classical 
training,  and  afterward  graduated  in  medicine  in  Philadel- 
phia. In  1832  he  entered  the  ministry  in  the  Ohio  Confer- 
ence. In  1838  he  entered  the  Norwalk  Seminary  as  princi- 
pal. His  success  here  pointed  him  out  as  the  fittest  man  for 
tlie  presidency  of  the  university.  For  fourteen  years  he 
filled  and  graced  this  ofiice.  No  college  president  in  tlie 
Church  has  shown  larger  administrative  abilities,  or  won  a 
more  enviable  place  in  the  affections  and  admiration  of 
college  and  Church  alike.  In  1860  he  was  called,  by  the 
General  Conference,  to  edit  " The  Christian  Advocate"  in 
New  York ;  and  again,  in  1864,  to  the  higher  office  of  Bishop 
in  the  Church.  He  died  suddenly  in  Wheeling,  W.  Ya., 
March  22,  1870.     Bishop  Thomson's  publications  are  nnmer- 


Ohio  Wesleyan  University.  339 

0U8,  and  his  literary  remains  yet  in  manuscript  are  very 
extensive. 

Rev.  Frederick  Merrick  was  educated  in  the  Wesleyan 
University,  Middletown,  Conn.  In  1836  he  became  prin- 
cipal of  Amenia  Seminary,  New  York ;  and,  in  1838,  pro- 
fessor of  natural  science  in  Ohio  University,  Athens,  and 
rhember  of  the  Ohio  Conference.  In  1843  the  Conference 
appointed  him  financial  agent  of  the  Ohio  "Wesleyan  Uni- 
versity, to  which  institution  he  has  since  that  time  devoted 
his  life.  In  1845  he  was  elected  professor  of  natural  sci- 
ence, and  was  made  acting  president  for  the  year  until  Dr. 
Thomson  entered  upon  duty.  In  1851  he  was  transferred 
to  the  chair  of  moral  philosophy,  and,  on  the  resignation  of 
President  Thomson,  was  chosen  as  his  successor.  He  held 
this  office  for  thirteen  years;  and  then,  in  view  of  failing 
strength,  in  1873,  he  resigned  the  presidency  and  was  aj)- 
pointed  lecturer  on  natural  and  revealed  religion.  This 
relation  to  the  college  he  still  sustains. 

Eev.  Chas.  II.  Payne,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  was  graduated  in  1856 
at  Wesleyan  University,  Middletown,  Conn.  A  vigorous 
thinker,  an  accomplished  speaker  and  writer,  and  a  devoted 
pastor,  he  has  served  some  of  the  leading  Methodist  Episco- 
pal churches  in  Brooklyn,  Philadelphia,  and  Cincinnati.  It 
was  from  this  last  city  that  he  was  called  to  the  presidency 
of  the  university  in  1875.  He  took  his  seat  the  following 
year.  His  administration  began  in  the  gloomiest  days  of  finan- 
cial depression ;  but  the  growth  of  the  university  during  his 
administration  has  been  very  rapid  and  great.  A  quickened 
interest  for  the  university  was  felt  throughout  the  Church  ; 
the  four  Conferences  were  stimulated  to  renewed  efforts  for 
the  endowment;  the  school  was  advertised  on  a  much  more 
liberal  scale  than  before,  and,  not  least,  the  university  and  the 


340  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

female  college  were  united.  This  measure,  whicli  had  long 
been  advocated  and  worked  for  by  many  friends  of  both 
schools,  was  at  length  accomplished  in  1877. 

The  professors  who  have  held  chairs  in  the  university  are : 

Kev.  Herman  M.  Johnson,  D.D.,  professor  of  ancient  lan- 
guage and  literature.  He  was  a  graduate  of  Wesleyan  Uni- 
versity, Middletown,  Conn.,  and  before  coming  to  Delaware 
had  held  the  chair  of  ancient  languages  in  St.  Charles  Col- 
lege, Missouri,  and  in  Augusta  College,  Kentucky.  Profess- 
or Johnson  had  abilities,  as  an  instructor,  of  the  first  order. 
After  six  years'  service  here  he  accepted  the  professorship  of 
philosophy  in  Dickinson  College,  and  was  afterward  raised 
to  the  presidency.     In  this  office  he  died  in  1868. 

Rev.  Professor  Solomon  Howard,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  had  been 
at  the  head  of  the  preparatory  school  for  two  years  be- 
fore the  organization  of  the  college  faculty.  At  that  time 
he  was  appointed  professor  of  mathematics,  but  held  the 
office  for  only  one  year.  He  was  subsequently,  for  some 
years,  principal  of  the  Springfield  Female  College,  and  be- 
came president  of  the  Ohio  University,  at  Athens,  in  1852. 
He  died  in  California  in  1873. 

Rev.  Professor  Lorenzo  D.  McCabe,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  came 
into  the  faculty  as  the  successor  of  Professor  Howard.  He 
was  graduated  at  the  Ohio  University  in  1843.  He  then  be- 
came a  member  of  the  Ohio  Conference,  and  preached  one 
year ;  but,  in  the  year  1844,  was  appointed  to  the  chair  of 
mathematics  and  mechanical  philosophy  in  his  alma  mater. 
In  1845  he  was  called  to  the  same  chair  in  the  Ohio  "Wes- 
leyan University  ;  and,  in  1860,  was  transferred  to  the  chair 
of  biblical  literature  and  moral  science.  In  1864,  by  a  re- 
arrangement of  the  college  work,  his  chair  was  named  "  phi- 
losophy."    To  this  department  he  has  since  given  his  entire 


Ohio  Wesley  an  University.  341 

services,  except  in  the  years  1873  to  1876,  during  which  he 
was  also  acting  president. 

Rev.  Professor  William  G.  Williams,  LL.D.,  was  gradu- 
ated at  Woodward  College,  in  Cincinnati,  in  1844,  and 
the  same  year  was  appointed  to  a  place  in  the  new  faculty  of 
the  university  as  principal  of  the  preparatory  department. 
In  1847  he  was  promoted  to  the  adjunct  professorship  of 
ancient  languages,  and,  in  1850,  to  the  full  chair  of  Greek 
and  Latin  languages.  This  appointment  he  held  until  1864, 
when  his  chair  was  divided,  and  he  became  professor  of  Greek 
language  and  literature.  In  1872  Professor  Williams  was 
appointed  the  acting  professor  of  Hebrew  language  and  lit- 
erature. In  1856  he  became  a  member  of  the  Central  Ohio 
Conference,  of  which  body  he  has  for  twenty-live  years  been 
the  secretary. 

Rev.  Professor  William  L.  Harris,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  was 
educated  at  Norwalk  Seminary,  and  joined  the  Michigan 
Conference  in  1837.  By  the  division  of  the  Michigan  Con- 
ference he  fell,  in  1840,  into  the  North  Ohio  Conference. 
After  preaching  two  yeai-s  at  Toledo  he  accepted  the  princi- 
palshipof  Baldwin  Seminary,  at  Berea.  In  1851  he  was  re- 
called to  Delaware,  as  principal  of  the  academical  depart- 
ment, and  was  the  next  year  appointed  professor  of  natui*al 
sciences.  In  this  chair  he  remained  eight  years,  till  1860. 
In  the  meanwhile,  by  the  division  of  the  North  Ohio  Con- 
ference, Professor  Harris  .had  become  connected  with  the 
Central  Ohio.  In  1860,  by  the  appointment  of  the  General 
Confej-ence,  he  became  one  of  the  secretaries  of  the  Mission- 
ary Society  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  In  1872 
he  was  elected  to  the  Episcopate. 

Rev.  Professor  William  D.  Godman,  D.D.,  was  the  second 
graduate  of  the  university,  in  1846.     He  entered  the  min- 


342  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

jstry  in  the  Korth  Ohio  Conference,  but,  in  1849,  served 
the  university  for  one  year  as  principal  of  the  academical 
department.  He  was  then  president  of  the  Worthington 
Female  College  for  some  years,  and  afterward  professor  of 
Greek  for  awhile  in  the  North-western  University,  at  Evans- 
ton,  111.  From  thence  he  was  called  to  a  chair  in  his  alma 
mater.     Dr.  Godman  is  now  at  work  in  the  South. 

Rev.  Professor  Francis  S.  Hoyt,  D.D.,  was  graduated  at 
"Wesleyan  University,  Middletown,  Conn.,  and  shortly  after 
became  president  of  the  Willamette  University,  Oregon.  In 
1860  he  was  called  to  the  chair  of  natural  science  in  the 
Ohio  Wesleyan  University,  and  served  in  this  department  for 
five  years.  In  1865  he  was  transferred  to  the  chair  of  theol- 
ogy and  biblical  literature,  in  which  he  remained  for  seven 
years.  In  1872  Professor  Hoyt  was  elected  editor  of  the 
*'  Western  Christian  Advocate,"  at  Cincinnati,  which  office 
he  filled  twelve  years. 

Eev.  Wm.  F.  Whitlock,  D.D.,  was  graduated  at  the  Ohio 
Wesleyan  University  in  1859,  and  was  appointed  tutor  in  lan- 
guages. In  1864  he  was  promoted  to  an  adjunct  professor- 
ship of  Latin,  and,  in  1866,  received  the  appointment  to  the 
full  professorship.     In  this  chair  he  has  since  remained. 

John  P.  Lacroix,  Ph.D.,  D.D.,  was  graduated  from  the 
Ohio  Wesleyan  University  in  1857.  A  descendant  of  an  old 
Huguenot  family,  the  French  was  his  vernacular  language, 
and  he  had  also  acquired  the  German.  In  1864  he  was  made 
adjunct  professor  of  French  and  German  in  the  university, 
and,  in  1866,  was  raised  to  the  professorship  of  modern  lan- 
guages and  history.  In  1879  he  visited  Europe  in  quest  of 
health,  but  returned  to  die  at  his  home. 

Rev.  Hiram  Perkins,  M.A.,  is  another  graduate  of  the 
class  of  1857.    He  served  the  university  five  years  as  tutor. 


Ohio  Wesleyan  University.  343 

and  then  became  adjunct  professor  in  mathematics  and  as- 
tronomy.    In  1867  he  became  full  professor. 

"Wm.  O.  Semans,  M.A.,  was  graduated  in  the  same  class. 
He  taught  eight  years  in  different  schools,  and  then  was  hon- 
ored with  a  chair  in  his  alma  inater^  where  he  yet  remains. 

Professor  Edward  T.  Nelson,  M.A.,  Ph.D.,  was  graduated 
from  this  university  in  1866.  He  then  entered  the  Sheffield 
Scientific  School,  and  was  graduated  Ph.D.  in  1869.  He 
taught  the  natural  sciences  three  years  in  his  alma  mater, 
then  three  years  in  Hanover  College,  Indiana,  until  recalled 
to  his  old  college  as  the  alum^ni  professor  of  natural  history, 
so  named  because  the  chair  was  endowed  by  alumni. 

The  matriculation  books  of  the  university  show  that  more 
than  eight  thousand  students,  not  including  ladies,  have  been 
enrolled.  Of  these,  one  thousand  and  twenty -five  remained 
to  graduation.  In  these  Western  States  the  channels  of 
business  are  so  wide  and  inviting  that  it  is  difficult  to  induce 
students  to  stay  for  a  degree.  To  this  must  be  added  the 
consideration  that  a  very  large  number  of  the  matriculants 
arc  poor,  and  are  under  the  necessity  of  earning  the  means 
of  support  in  college  by  manual  labor  or  by  teaching.  It  de- 
mands an  extraordinary  strength  of  character  and  zeal  for 
learning,  for  such  persons,  already  competent  to  the  active 
duties  of  life,  to  remain  in  school  from  four  to  seven  years. 
Yet,  of  the  seven  thousand  who  have  gone  out  under  gradu- 
ation, a  large  number  have  taken  advanced  courses  of  con- 
siderable extent.  The  latitude  of  choice  offered  in  the  sc\'- 
eral  courses  of  study  enables  a  student  to  shape  his  work  in 
school  with  reference  to  his  anticipated  business  needs,  and 
so  to  acquire  a  rcsixjctable  education  without  taking  a  degree. 

More  than  two  hundred  have  entered  the  ministry ;  more 
than  two  himdred  are  professors  or  teacliers  ;  nearly  as  many 


344  Early  Schools  of  MpyrnoDisM. 

have  entered  the  practice  of  law,  and  about  fifty  the  practice 
of  medicine.  The  remainder  are  found  in  various  other  call- 
ings, many  having  held  offices  under  the  State  and  national 
governments.     These  graduates  are  now  widely  scattered. 

The  university  is  under  the  auspices  of  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church,  but  it  is  not  sectarian  in  its  teachings.  It  aims 
to  be  evangelical,  yet  liberal ;  and  has  always  had  a  fair  patron- 
age from  other  Protestant  Churches,  and  even  from  the 
Catholic  Churcli.  Weekly  meetings  for  prayer  are  main- 
tained by  each  class  separately,  and  one  weekly  meeting  for 
all  students  in  common  who  choose  to  attend.  The  propor- 
tion of  religious  students  in  the  college  classes  increases  with 
the  advancement  of  the  class  ;  and  few  pass  through  the  col- 
lege course  without  becoming  hopefully  pious. 

The  religious  zeal  of  the  students  led  to  the  establishment 
in  the  university,  and  the  successful  working  for  a  long  time, 
of  a  Missionary  Lyceum.  From  this  association,  and  largely 
through  influences  there  begotten,  a  goodly  number  of  the 
graduates  have  been  led  to  devote  themselves  to  the  foreign 
missionary  work.*  For  some  years  a  Young  Men's  Chris- 
tian Association  has  been  sustained  in  the  school.  Of  the. 
young  men  preparing  for  the  ministry  those  who  are  licen- 
tiates are  faithful  in  evangelical  work  in  the  city  and  in  the 
neighboring  country. 

LITERARY  SOCIETIES. 

The  students  have  five  literary  societies.  Of  these  the 
Zetagathean,  the  Christomathean,  and  the  Athenian  are  con- 

*  One  of  this  number,  Rev.  Dr.  Scott,  of  the  India  Mission,  has  sent  to  the 
university  a  complete  pantheon  of  the  idols  of  Hindostan.  Tliey  are  in  mar- 
ble, gilt,  about  sixty  in  number,  and  constitute,  perhaps,  the  finest  collection  in 
the  United  States.     Tiie  Lyceum  has  many  other  symbols  from  heathen  lands. 


Ohio  Wksleyan  University.  345 

fined  to  the  college  classes.  They  have  well-furnished  halls. 
The  Meleterian  and  Philomathean  societies  are  sustained  bj 
the  students  in  the  preparatory  classes. 

The  ladies  of  Monnett  Hall  have  two  literary  societies, 
with  large  and  tastefully  furnished  halls.  The  beneficial  in- 
fluence of  these  upon  the  members  is  very  decided. 

The  Greek-letter  societies  have  eight  chapters  in  this  uni- 
versity.    Their  influence  is  regarded  as  salutary. 

COURSES   OF   STUDY. 

At  the  organization  of  the  university  there  was  but  one 
course  of  study  adopted,  substantially  the  same  as  had  ob- 
tained for  generations  in  the  usages  of  colleges.  Its  basis 
was  the  classic  languages.  The  study  of  Greek  and  Latin 
occupied  most  of  the  time  in  the  preparatory  classes,  half  of 
the  time  in  the  freshman  and  sophomore  years,  and  one 
third  of  the  time  for  the  last  two  years  of  the  course.  And 
this  general  arrangement  continued  with  gradual  modifica- 
tions till  the  year  1868.  This,  which  was  called  the  "  clas- 
sical course,"  or  the  "  regular  course,"  was  the  only  one  for 
which  a  degree  was  conferred. 

In  1868  a  scientific  course   was  first  established   in  this 

university.     It  threw  out  the  Greek  language  entirely,  but 

required  Latin  and  one  modern  language.     In  addition  to 

this,  a  certain  amount  of  deviation  from  the  studies  of  the 

regular  course  was  allowed  in  the  sophomore  and  the  junior 

years  in  favor  of  modern  languages,  or  additional  scientific 

studies.     This  is  a  safe  coinpromise,  and  allows  a  sufficient 

latitude  of  election,  without,  at  the  same  time,  prescribiuir  a 

coui*se  which  can  be  cjilled  partial  or  one-sided.     The  degrees 

given  in  the  classical  course  are  bachelor  of  arts,  and,  throe 

years  afterward,  master  of  arts ;  in  the  scientific  course,  bach- 
15* 


346  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

elor  of  science.     A  second  degree  has  not  yet  been  established 
for  the  last  course. 

The  normal  department  has  been  revived,  and  a  fair 
course  of  study,  extending  through  three  years,  has  been  pre- 
scribed, adapted  especially  to  those  who  would  fit  themselves 
for  teaching  in  the  common  schools.  It  is  the  hope  of  the 
university  to  make  this  course  both  attractive  and  useful  to 
this  large  class  of  youth.  A  professional  certificate,  but  no 
degree,  is  given  to  those  who  complete  this  course.  All  the 
above  courses  are  now  open  to  ladies. 

INCOME   AND   ENDOWMENTS. 

Nearly  all  students  in  this  institution  are  upon  scholar- 
ships, and  the  income  for  meeting  current  expenses  is  derived 
almost  exclusively  from  interest  on  the  Scholarship  Fund. 
The  actual  endowment  is  now  above  one  third  of  a  million 
dollars,  and  each  of  the  patronizing  Conferences  is  at  w^ork 
to  endow  additional  professorships.  A  number  of  special 
gifts  in  cash,  lands,  or  in  legacies  have  been  made. 

Mr.  Jedediah  Allen  gave  a  tract  of  land  that  brought 
$18,000;  Thomas  Parr ott,  Esq.,  bequeathed  $20,000;  John 
E.  JVright,  $25,000,  and  secured  from  others  $5,000 ;  Phin- 
eas  P.  Mast,  Esq.,  has  paid  $10,000,  besides  other  benefac- 
tions. The  last  three  are  trustees.  Mrs.  Eliza  Chrisman, 
now  of  Topeka,  Kan.,  has  paid  $10,000,  and  pledged  $10,000 
to  the  chair  of  biblical  literature.  Other  generous  gifts 
swell  the  above  to  about  $200,000.  The  library  and  cabinet 
of  natural  history  have  been  greatly  enriched  by  purchases 
and  donations. 

Originally  no  provision  for  ladies  was  made  by  the  univer- 
sity, but  by  the  purchase,  in  1853,  of  the  residence  of  the 
late  William  Little,  Ohio  Wesleyan  Female  College  acquired 


Ohio  Wesleyan  University.  347 

a  local  habitation  and  a  name.  The  price  paid  was  $7,000 
for  the  seven  acres,  and  about  the  same  for  an  additional 
three  acres.  The  grounds  were  beautiful  and  romantic,  and 
the  house  large  and  commodious;  yet  more  room  was  de- 
manded -svithin  the  first  year. 

New  and  elegant  buildings  have  been  erected.  Of  the 
many  who  contributed  to  this  cause,  particular  mention 
should  be  made  of  Miss  Mary  Monnett  (Mrs.  John  Bain),  a 
pupil  of  the  school,  who,  in  1857,  gave  $10,000  toward  the 
building,  and  in  recognition  of  her  benefaction  the  entii-e 
building  is  called 

Monnett  Hall. 
The  first  president  of  this  branch  of  the  university  was 
Professor  Oran  Faville,  M.A. ;  and  Mrs.  Maria  M.  Faville 
was  the  first  preceptress.  The  formal  union  of  the  two  insti- 
tutions took  place  in  1877.  Since  then  the  doors  of  this 
great  university  have  .been  open  to  ladies.  This  action 
secured  the  university  a  large  increase  of  students,  friends, 
and  income.  The  distance  of  the  principal  buildings  is  at- 
tended with  some  inconveniences.  But  the  advantages  from 
the  union  are  so  manifest  and  so  great,  that,  in  summing  up 
the  result,  minor  inconveniences  can  be  patiently  adjusted  or 
quietly  ignored.  Co-education  in  Delaware  is  an  unqualified 
success. 


348  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTEE  XXL 

CINCINNATI  WESLEYAN  COLLEGE  FOR   YOUNG  WOMEN. 

BY  MRS.   McCLELLAN  BROWN,   VICE-PRESIDENT. 

"  Our  daughters  as  corner-stones  hewn  after  the  fashion  of  a  palace." 

— PsA.  cxliv,  12.    [Rev.  Ver.] 

It  is  one  of  the  most  notable  facts  in  the  history  of  the  Meth- 
odist Episcopal  Church  that  she  was  the  first  to  offer  woman  a 
liberal  collegiate  education.  The  Cincinnati  Weslejan  College 
for  Young  "Women  was  founded  in  1842,  being  the  first  regu- 
larly chartered  college  for  women  in  the  world.  It  was  not 
narrowly  sectarian,  from  the  first  having  had  every  religious 
creed  represented  in  its  board  of  trustees,  its  faculty,  and  its 
roll  of  pupils  ;  but  the  enterprise  was  Method istic  in  its  finan- 
cial basis,  and  in  its  able  defense  against  pessimism.  Hence 
this  historic  college  is  one  of  the  proudest  achievements  of 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  A  few  institutions  for  the 
exclusive  education  of  girls  were  founded  prior  to  that  date, 
but  nothing  affording  the  facilities  for  a  liberal  education. 
There  were  schools  and  academies  to  prepare  young  men  for 
college,  and  for  commercial  and  industrial  pursuits.  An 
occasional  persistent  young  woman  found  access  to  these, 
ant!  laid  the  foundation  for  a  liberal  culture.  The  schools 
for  girls  were  of  a  similar  order,  whether  called  academies 
or  colleges.  At  that  time,  it  must  be  remembered,  there  was 
not  a  public  high  school  west  of  the  Alleghany  Mountains. 
A  scheme  for  planting  a  college  with  all  the  facilities  and 
equipments  necessary  for  the  broadest  culture  for  women 
was  entirely  new.     It  opened  the  whole  question  of  possi- 


Cincinnati  Wesi-eyan  College  for  Yoing  Women.   3-1:9 

bility,  feasibility,  and  practicability  of  preparing  young 
women  intellectually  for  wider  fields  of  usefulness  and  for 
self -competency.  This  subject  was  canvassed  widely  in  the 
newspapers  of  the  country.  It  was  conceded  that  the  scheme 
embraced  a  broad  education  in  respect  to  the  number  of 
studies  involved,  the  manner  in  which  they  should  be  prose- 
cuted, the  conferment  of  collegiate  degrees,  and  the  conse- 
quent ability  for  positions  and  professions,  debarred,  by  com- 
mon usage,  from  the  sex.  Pessimists  deplored  the  threaten- 
ing revolution.  But  it  came — a  revolution  which  bore  on 
its  breast  an  impetus  and  power  for  the  truest  progress.  It 
carried  into  the  very  foundations  of  society  a  respect  for 
learning  and  aspiration,  for  intellectual  development  and  dis- 
cipline. It  brought  the  fine  arts  into  the  household,  and  by 
implication  introduced  to  the  model  home,  the  sciences,  not 
physical  alone,  but  practical  and  spiritual.  It  awakened  the 
dormant  social  existence  to  the  high  value  of  remote  as  well 
as  intimate  human  relations — to  an  enlarged  view  of  the  hu- 
man race  through  history,  literature,  language  (that  magical 
key  to  intellectual  power  and  enjoyment),  and  through  phi- 
losophy, which  is  the  condition  of  all  science.  These  subjects, 
when  understood  only  by  men,  moved  the  external  world  in 
material  lines  of  progress  ;  but  when  introduced  to  the  brain 
and  province  of  women,  they  thrilled  along  the  nerves  of 
the  inner  life  of  the  nation,  impelling  the  right  reason  in 
every  advance  movement  for  the  betterment  of  social  con- 
ditions. This  was  truly  an  epoch  of  power  in  our  civili- 
zation. 

Mrs.  Mary  C.  Wilber,  widow  of  the  first  president  of  the 
Wcsleyan  College,  says :  **With  the  old  traditions  reaching 
back  through  the  ages,  with  the  startling  newness  of  the  idea 
that  women  needed  equal  culture  of  mind  and  heart  witii 


350  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

men,  to  enable  them  to  be  truly  'corner-stones'  in  their 
homes,  in  the  Church,  and  in  the  State,  it  was  not  singular 
that  the  plan  proposed  met  with  opposition.  The  prudence 
of  such  an  enterprise  was  questioned  in  the  strongest  terms. 
It  was  regarded  as  inconsistent  with  conservative  customs, 
and  hostile  to  true  orthodoxy.  But,"  Mrs.  Wilber  goes  on  to 
say,  "  the  originators  of  this  enterprise  were  earnest  men  ;  they 
were  also  practical  men,  who,  clearly  perceiving  the  path  of 
duty,  could  not  be  discouraged  by  obstacles,  turned  aside 
by  either  self-interest  or  opposition.  They  were  convinced 
that  a  higher  intellectual  and  moral  education  for  women  was 
indispensable  to  the  continued  existence  and  prosperity  of 
our  government ;  that  it  would  be  a  powerful  influence  for 
good  in  the  home,  in  social  life,  and  in  all  benevolences. 
They  believed  in  the  elevation  of  women  through  education, 
which  is  development;  through  labor,  which  is  salvation; 
through  legal  rights,  which  are  only  freedom  to  develop  and 
save.  They  believed  these  aims  to  be  part  of  the  mission  of 
Jesus  upon  earth,  and  authorized  by  him,  inspired  of  God, 
they  are  as  sure  of  fulfillment  as  any  portion  of  his  law. 
They  were  men  of  faith,  men  of  prayer,  men  of  deeds,  who 
believed  in  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  the  relation  of  each 
individual  to  God,  whom  they  revered.  Such  were  the 
founders  of  the  first  regularly  chartered  college  for  women 
in  the  world." 

These  men  were  :  Bishop  Thomas  A.  Morris,  president ; 
board  of  trustees — Adam  IT.  Riddle,  treasurer ;  Samuel  Will- 
iams, secretary ;  Josiah  Lawrence,  Asbury  M.  Scarles,  John 
Elstner,  Harvey  Decamp,  Joseph  G.  Rust,  John  Dubois, 
John  Reeves,  William  Woodruff,  Jabez  Seegar,  George  W. 
Townley,  and  ten  ex-officio  members  of  the  Ohio  Conference. 
The  executive  committee:  Rev.  John  F.  Wright,  Samuel 


Cincinnati  Wesleyan  College  for  Young  Women.   351 

"Williams,  Adam  W.  Riddle,  Asbury  M.  Searles,  and  Harvey 
Decamp. 

Perlee  B.  Wilbur,  A.M.,  D.D.,  an  alumnus  of  tlie  Wes- 
leyan University,  for  some  years  a  teacher  in  the  Cazenovia 
Seminary,  at  the  time  a  member  of  the  Virginia  Conference, 
was  the  first  president.  He,  with  his  accomplished  and  tal- 
ented wife,  educated  at  the  Cazenovia  Seminary,  conducted 
the  new  college  with  vigor  and  skill  seventeen  successful 
years. 

The  effect  of  this  movement  was  ahnost  electrical  upon 
the  educational  world.  The  needs  and  demands  for  better 
culture  among  women  being  canvassed  so  widely,  aroused 
the  enlightened  communities  to  an  increased  interest  in  edu- 
cational institutions  for  both  sexes.  Seminaries  and  colleges 
increased  their  facilities,  and  new  institutions  were  founded 
more  numerously  than  in  any  previous  era.  In  the  last 
thirty-five  years  colleges  have  been  established  for  women  in 
this  country  and  Great  Britain — some  of  them  have  been 
well  equipped  and  endowed,  while  the  Cincinnati  Wesleyan 
has  pursued  a  career  of  usefulness  unparalleled  in  history. 

President  Wilbur  died  June  11, 1859.  Rev.  Robert  Allyn, 
of  the  New  England  Conference,  was  elected  his  successor 
until  1863,  when  Rev.  Richard  Rust,  D.D.,  was  chosen  to  the 
presidency. 

During  the  year  1860  Bishop  Clark  was  efficient  in  effect- 
ing the  sale  of  the  original  property,  on  Vine  Street,  and, 
after  paying  an  indebtedness  which  had  embarrassed  the 
institution,  applied  the  surplus  toward  the  erection  of  the 
elegant  new  building  upon  the  present  eligible  site,  donated 
by  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Churclies  of  Cincinnati. 

Rev.  Lucius  II.  Bugbee,  D.D..  assumed  the  duties  of  the 
presidency    in   the   new  edifice  in  1868,  and  continued  iu 


862  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

efficient  management  until  1875,  when  Eev.  D.  H.  Moore, 
D.D.,  of  the  Cincinnati  Conference,  succeeded  to  the  office, 
and  soon  afterward  secured  subscriptions  for  tlie  college 
from  the  citizens  of  Cincinnati  to  the  amount  of  about 
$25,000.  Kev.  Kichard  Kust,  D.D.,  Jr.,  became  the  next 
successor  to  the  presidency  for  the  years  1880  and  1881, 
when  an  indebtedness  had  accumulated  for  which  the  entire 
college  property  was  pressed  to  sale. 

In  August,  1882,  tlie  present  president.  Rev.  W.  K.  Brown, 
D.D.,  member  of  the  Pittsburg  Conference,  and  having 
acquired  a  reputation  as  a  successful  church  financier,  was 
informed  of  the  perilous  condition  of  the  institution  through 
Dr.  J.  M.  Walden,  president  of  the  board  of  trustees.  He 
went  to  Cincinnati,  and,  with  Bishop  I.  W.  Wiley  and  Dr. 
TValden,  looked  over  the  whole  field  and  pronounced  the 
institution  redeemable.  He  undertook  the  work  immedi- 
ately, first  securing  a  subscription  of  $10,000  from  a  friend, 
Dr.  C.  G.  Hussey,  of  Pittsburg.  Pa.,  and  afterward  the 
required  subscription  of  $65,000  from  friends  of  education, 
chiefly  in  Cincinnati.  One  third  of  this  was  collected  and 
paid,  the  building  renovated,  and  the  school  opened  with 
vigor  the  following  September,  1882.  Since  that  date  he 
has  collected  the  remaining  subscriptions,  paid  the  debt,  and 
managed  the  incomes  to  meet  the  expenses  of  a  prosperous 
and  continually  growing  school. 

The  property  is  valued  at  about  $225,000,  and  is  all  clear 
of  debt,  except  two  lots  at  the  south  end  of  the  lawn,  which 
will  be  redeemed  soon.  The  grounds  are  two  hundred  and 
eighty-five  feet  front,  by  one  hundred  and  fifteen  feet  deep. 
The  building  stands  on  an  elevation,  twenty-five  feet  from 
the  avenue,  named  for  the  college,  Wesley.  Tlie  structure 
is  an  imposing  combination  of  Gothic  "and  Corinthian  archi- 


Cincinnati  Wesley a.n  College  for  Young  Women.   353 

tectiire.  There  are  two  entrances  front,  three  stair- ways, 
and  spacious  halls  and  parlors  of  the  most  commodious  style. 
It  is  one  hundred  and  seventy-two  feet  front  by  sixty  feet 
deep,  with  a  south-west  wing,  forty  by  thirty  feet  in  size. 
The  rooms  are  designed  for  two  students ;  they  have  good 
light,  very  high  ceilings,  and  excellent  ventilation.  Wesley 
Avenue  is  one  of  the  most  beautiful  and  quiet  streets  of  the 
city,  having  no  business  places  whatever — only  private  resi- 
dences, which  are  all  new  and  very  elegant,  and  easily  acces- 
sible to  all  parts  of  the  city. 

The  character  of  the  work  done  by  the  Cincinnati  Wes- 
leyan  has  made  its  impress,  not  only  upon  tlie  vicinity  where 
it  is  located,  but  upon  the  Church  at  large,  which  marches  to 
the  step  of  woman's  improved  powers  to  do  its  work  intelli- 
gently and  systematically.  It  has  made  its  impress  upon 
general  education,  which  waits  upon  woman's  transforming 
touch ;  upon  civil  methods,  which  respond  to  the  public  sen- 
timents of  reform,  the  obligations  of  morality,  and  the  arbi- 
trations of  equity  in  a  new  and  more  effective  sense  than 
ever  before.  Women  have  been  made  acquainted  with  sci- 
ence and  philosophy  in  their  practical  applications ;  with 
languages,  and  their  influence  upon  the  inner  life  of  a  peo- 
ple ;  with  the  treasures  of  history,  and  the  appropriation  of 
its  lessons  ;  with  the  best  and  purest  literature,  and  the  devel- 
opment of  its  fields ;  with  the  arts  of  music,  painting,  and 
decoration,  and  their  practical  application  in  domestic  as 
well  as  in  the  artistic  world ;  and,  chief  of  all  the  acquire- 
ments, women  have  been  made  acquainted  with  themselves, 
as  independent,  responsible  intelligences,  having  God's  own 
image  upon,  the  intellect  as  well  as  the  heart,  and  God's 
injunction  to  discipline  and  use,  according  to  the  gift  of 
pei*8onal  power  and  opportunity.     Not  in  the  sheltered  home 


354  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

alone  have  the  acquirements  and  influence  of  these  "Wes- 
lejan  students  been  felt  most  potentially.  Brave  and  earnest 
women  have  made  some  of  the  most  desirable  ways  of  earning 
a  living  where  loss  of  fortune  has  necessitated.  They  have 
carved  the  path,  and  secured  the  right  for  others  to  follow. 
Some  have  become  eminent  professors  of  colleges  and  prin- 
cipals and  founders  of  successful  seminaries  in  different  parts 
of  the  world.  Scores  have  become  missionaries  in  all  the 
open  fields  of  the  world,  Europe,  India,  China,  Japan,  Soutli 
America,  and  Mexico.  Ladies  from  these  eminent  Wes- 
leyan  halls  have  graced  the  highest  social  circles  of  Britain, 
France,  and  Eome,  and  presided  in  every  representative  ofii- 
cial  home  of  the  United  States,  from  the  greater  than  baro- 
nial country  homestead,  to  the  more  than  royal  White  House 
at  Washington,  where  one  has  made  an  immortal  record  of 
moral  courage — Mrs.  Lucy  Webb  Hayes.  A  number  have 
acquired  a  national  reputation  in  fields  of  literature,  pliilan- 
thropy,  and  civil  reform  works.  Their  names  are  household 
words,  and  the  children  of  the  generation  are  called  for 
them. 

The  Alumnse  Association  of  the  Wesleyan  College  was 
founded  in  1852,  the  first  among  women.  It  was  incorpo- 
rated with  the  usual  powers  and  privileges,  and  has  ever 
been,  and  still  is,  a  great  fortress  to  the  institution.  The 
latest  movement  of  the  association  is  for  the  endowment 
of  the  college  as  a  university  for  women. 


TuE  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute.  356 


CHAPTER  XXIL 

THE  NEWARK  WESLEYAN  INSTITUTR 

BY  DANIEL  P.   KIDDER,    D.D. 

The  year  1816  witnessed  the  first  effort  to  establish  an 
educational  institution  in  the  interest  of  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church  in  the  northern  half  of  New  Jersey.  During 
that  year  the  subject  was  so  successfully  agitated  that  a  valid 
stock  subscription  of  $10,000  was  secured  for  the  purpose. 
The  city  of  Newark  was,  from  the  first,  fixed  upon  as  its 
proper  locality.- 

mCORPOEATION. 

On  the  21th  of  November,  1846,  the  subscribing  stock- 
holders met  in  the  Clinton  Street  Methodist  Episcopal  Church 
of  the  city  named,  and  elected  a  board  of  trustees.  The  elected 
trustees  proceeded  to  incorporate  the  institution  under  the 
title  of  "  The  Newark  "Wesleyan  Institute  for  Male  and 
Female  Education." 

Measures  were  immediately  tiiken  to  enlarge  the  stock 
subscription,  to  select  and  purchase  an  eligible  site,  to  plan 
an  edifice  adapted  to  the  object,  and  to  contract  for  its 
erection. 

CORNER-STONK    LAYING. 

So  vigorously  were  these  important  measures  prosecuted, 
that  on  the  23d  of  September,  1847,  the  corner-stone  of  the 
Newark  Wesleyan  Institute  was  laid,  with  imposing  ceremo- 
nies and  under  the  most  favorable  auspices.  On  the  5th  day 
of  November  following,  the  cupola  of  the  institute  towered 
above  the  city  of  Newark. 


356  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

From  a  prospectus,  issued  in  1848,  the  following  descrip- 
tion of  the  building  is  taken  : 

It  is  of  brick,  seventy-five  feet  in  length  by  fifty-five  in  width.  It  is 
three  stories  high,  and  surmounted  by  a  fine  observatory.  The  location 
of  the  building  is  at  once  convenient  and  admirable.  It  stands  upon 
an  elevated  site,  between  High  and  Shipman  Streets,  on  the  second 
block  south  of  the  court-house  of  Essex  County.  The  site  extends 
from  street  to  street,  and  the  building,  being  placed  centrally,  has 
two  equal  fronts,  with  front  yards  extending  to  the  street  on  both 
sides. 

This  arrangement  is  in  harmony  with  the  fundamental  design  of  the 
institution,  to  furnish  equal  facilities  for  male  and  female  education. 
It,  moreover,  avoids  the  objections  heretofore  existing  against  the  or- 
ganization of  similar  institutions.  The  building  is  so  constructed  as 
to  furnish  two  entire  suits  of  apartments,  connecting  together  only  at 
the  principal's  room,  the  parlor,  the  recitation  rooms,  and  the  chapel. 
Thus  young  gentlemen  and  young  ladies  who  may  be  members  of  the 
institute  will  approach  it  from  different  streets  and  enter  at  opposite 
sides.  Their  study  rooms  will  be  entirely  separate,  and  they  will  only 
meet  hi  the  presence  of  their  teachers ;  yet  they  will  be  subject  to  the 
same  government,  and  under  the  influence  of  a  common  discipline. 

This  institute  is  designed  to  be  purely  literary  in  its  character,  al- 
though it  will  not  seek  to  promote  literature  at  the  expense  of  Chris- 
tianity. Acknowledging  the  connection  that  ever  ought  to  exist  be- 
tween Learning  and  her  handmaid,  Religion,  it  will  recognize  and  incul- 
cate the  common  and  fundamental  principles  of  Christian  truth,  free 
from  sectarianism. 

Its  name,  Wesleyan,  is  designed  as  at  once  a  suitable  tribute  to  the 
memory  of  a  distinguished  promoter  of  Christian  learning,  and  a  frank 
indication  of  the  Church  by  which  its  moral  and  Cliristian  character 
will  be  guaranteed  to  the  public. 

OPENING. 

On  the  30th  of  August,  1848,  the  formal  opening  of  the 
institute  took  place.     From  an  account  of  the  proceedings 


The  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute.  357 

published  by  the  "Newark  Daily  Advertiser"  the  following 
statements  are  condensed : 

"  The  exercises  of  the  opening  of  the  Newark  Wesleyan 
Institute  proved  an  occasion  of  high  gratification  to  a  numer- 
ous assembly.  At  an  early  hour  the  beautiful  chapel  of  the 
institute,  capable  of  containing  not  less  than  four  hundred 
persons,  was  tilled  with  an  intelligent  audience  of  ladies  and 
gentlemen. 

"  The  services  were  introduced  with  a  lesson  from  Script- 
ure read  by  Rev.  T.  Sovereign,  and  prayer  was  offered  by 
Rev.  Dr.  Charles  Hall.  The  inaugural  address  of  Mr.  Sidera 
Chase,  the  principal,  then  followed. 

"It  was  a  chaste  and  classical  production,  evincing  high 
scholarship  combined  with  thoroughly  practical  views  of  life 
and  its  duties.  It  was  delivered  in  a  good  style  of  elocution, 
and  listened  to  with  profound  attention.  Mr.  Chase  first 
drew  a  graphic  sketch  of  society,  and  of  the  evils  which  mar 
and  threaten  its  well-being.  He  then  proceeded  to  show 
what  constitutes  true  education — physical,  intellectual,  and 
moral.  All  these  phases  of  education  should  be  combined 
for  the  complete  training  of  the  individual.  Mr.  Chase's 
address  well  sustained  the  general  impression  of  his  fitness 
for  the  honorable  and  responsible  position  he  is  called  to 
occupy. 

"  Rev.  D.  P.  Kidder,  president  of  the  board  of  trustees,  then 
explained  briefly  the  general  plan  of  the  building  and  the 
comprehensive  system  of  education  to  which  it  is  adapted. 
From  his  remarks  the  following  particulars  are  condensed  as 
items  of  general  interest : 

"This  large  and  imposing  edifice  has  been  constructed  after  no  exist- 
ing model.  Its  plan  wa,s  devised  expressly  in  view  of  its  p.irticular 
oljjccts.     Two  leading  ideas  are  indicated  throughout  the  whole  struct- 


358  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

ure.  The  first  is  that  of  a  complete  classification  of  scholars  according 
to  their  advancement  and  the  studies  they  pursue.  By  means  of  this 
the  time  and  efforts  of  both  pupils  and  teachers  are  turned  to  the 
greatest  account,  and  to  secure  it,  not  less  than  eight  distinct  schools 
are  provided  for  in  this  one  building.  These  different  apartments  em- 
brace the  several  divisions  and  grades  in  which  the  school  is  to  be 
classified.  By  simply  closing  the  folding-doors  of  the  school-rooms 
six  more  apartments  may  be  created  whenever  necessary. 

"The  second  leading  design  of  the  building  is  an  easy  reunion  of  all 
the  classes  at  proper  times  and  for  important  purposes.  The  daily  ex- 
ercises will  be  commenced  at  the  chapel,  by  reading  the  Scriptures  and 
prayer,  the  whole  school  being  assembled.  Here,  also,  the  merit-roll 
will  be  periodically  read  and  familiar  and  scientific  lectures  delivered. 

"  In  the  recitation  rooms  scholars  of  both  sexes,  in  the  higher  grades 
will  meet  their  instructors,  subject  to  a  natural  and  powerful  stimulus 
to  correct  demeanor  and  scholar-like  bearing. 

"  There  will  be  observed  on  the  walls  of  the  building  a  lib- 
eral provision  of  blackboard,  so  that  every  scholar  may  have 
ample  room  for  practice,  and  every  science  be  reduced  to  dem- 
onstration. All  the  school-rooms  are  furnished  with  rotary 
chairs  of  proper  sizes,  and  closets  for  the  reception  of  hats 
and  cloaks.  Instruction  in  linear  drawing  and  in  vocal  nmsic 
are  to  be  free  in  all  the  divisions  of  the  school. 

"  The  parlor  will  serve  as  a  reception  room  for  visitors  and 
for  social  interviews  between  the  more  advanced  scholars 
and  their  teachers  and  friends.  It  contains  cases  for  books, 
minerals,  and  shells.  The  building  will  be  heated  throughout 
by  furnaces  located  in  the  basement. 

"  At  the  close  of  the  public  services,"  says  the  report,  '^  the 
gentlemen  and  ladies  present  passed  through  the  building  at 
pleasure,  making  their  observations  at  different  points,  from 
the  commanding  observatory  downward.  There  seemed  to 
be  a  universal  expression  of  admiration  for  the  appearance  of 
the  edifice  and  the  prospect  it  commands  at  every  window." 


The  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute.  359 

organization  and  school-work. 

On  the  6th  of  September,  1848,  the  work  of  instruction 
commenced,  with  more  than  two  hundred  pupils  in  attend- 
ance. Before  the  close  of  the  year  additions  to  the  number 
of  scholars  had  been  made,  until  nearly  the  entire  capacity  of 
the  building  had  been  filled.  The  second  annual  catalogue 
of  the  institute  enumerated  four  hundred  and  twenty-eight 
pupils,  that  of  the  third  year  four  hundred  and  thirty-three, 
and  that  of  the  fourth  year  four  hundred  and  thirty-four. 
The  institution  was  thoroughly  organized  on  the  system  con- 
templated in  the  plan  of  the  building.  Instruction  was  given 
by  an  able  faculty,  composed  of  fourteen  teachers.  The 
course  of  study  was  ample  and  systematically  progressive 
from  a  first  primary  grade  to  a  graduation  in  the  normal  de- 
partment, which,  in  point  of  fact,  was  the  first  normal  school 
organized  In  the  State  of  New  Jersey. 

From  the  chapel  services,  with  which  each  school  day  was 
opened,  the  teachers  and  scholars  of  the  different  grades  were 
dismissed  to  their  several  rooms.  In  the  parlor  any  trustee, 
parent,  or  visitor  could  find  a  schedule  indicating  the  recita- 
tion and  teacher  for  each  department  and  room  at  any  hour 
of  the  day.  Clianges  of  exercises  in  the  different  rooms 
were  simultaneous,  and  signaled  by  tlie  striking  of  a  gong. 
Friday  afternoons  public  literary  and  musical  exercises  were 
lield  in  the  chapel,  which  had  a  strong  influence  in  develop- 
ing every  department  of  study.  On  those  occasions,  whicli 
were  largely  attended  by  visiting  friends,  the  standing  of 
the  pupils  was  announced. 

The  success  of  the  instructional  work  of  the  institute  was 
marked  from  a  very  early  day  in  its  history,  so  that  it  be- 
came no  infrequent  occurrence  to  receive  visitors  from  dis- 


360  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

tant  States  to  study  tlie  pUn  of  tlie  building,  the  system  of 
instruction,  and  the  results. 

The  moral  tone  of  the  school  was  uniformly  high.  Indeed, 
the  religious  element  was  so  influential  that  a  case  of  disci- 
pline became  a  matter  of  surprise. 

INSTEUOtOKS. 

The  highest  praise  has  always  been  considered  due  to 
Principal  Chase  for  his  great  skill  and  efficiency  in  organiz- 
ing and  conducting  the  institute  during  the  five  years  of  his 
connection  with  it.  In  his  arduous  work  and  unsparing  zeal 
he  was  supported  by  able  teachers,  several  of  whom  in  after 
years  became  celebrated  in  important  spheres  of  public  life. 
Of  these  mention  may  be  made  of  the  Rev.  Drs.  F.  S.  Hoyt, 
N.  J.  Burton,  and  J.  L.  G.  M'Kown ;  Profs.  B.  Starr  and  G. 
B.  Sears ;  also,  of  the  lady  teachers,  Mrs.  Green,  who  became 
the  wife  of  the  Hon.  Mr.  Stoughton,  and  Miss  Sperry,  who 
became  the  wife  of  Rev.  Dr.  Maclay.  Mrs.  Maclay  died,  as  a 
missionary  in  Japan,  after  many  years  of  effective  service  in 
that  country  and  China.  It  was  with  great  regret  on  the 
part  of  the  trustees  that  declining  health  made  it  necessary 
for  Mr.  Chase  to  resign  the  principalship  in  1853.  He  was 
dismissed  with  resolutions  of  high  encomium. 

Prof.  Starr  was  promoted  to  the  office,  which  he  ably  filled 
till  the  summer  of  1856.  Iluring  the  scliool  year  following. 
Revs.  R.  T.  Taylor  and  J.  H.  Knowles  acted  as  joint  prin- 
cipals. 

STUDENTS. 

It  is  impossible  to  mention  the  many  students  of  the  New- 
ark Wesleyan  Institute,  during  the  nine  years  of  its  action, 
who  subsequently  became  honored  and  useful  citizens  in  the 
various  walks  of  life.     The  following,  and  probably  some 


The  Kewakk  Wesleyan  Institute.  361 

others,  became  ministers  of  the  Gospel:  W.  E.  Duryee, 
II.  Luinmis,  D.  II.  Parish,  II.  M.  Simpson,  S.  M.  Stiles, 
W.  AVood,  J.  IL  Vincent,  and  G.  II.  Whitney.  The  last 
two  named  are  justly  celebrated  for  the  influence  they  have 
exerted  in  educational  spheres. 


PUBLIC   APPROVAL. 

Probably  no  institution  of  learning  in  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church,  if  in  any  other,  ever  rose  more  rapidly  into 
j)rominence,  or,  in  its  early  period  of  action,  gave  more  brill- 
iant promise  of  large  and  continued  usefulness.  In  evidence 
of  this  the  following  specimen  notices  from  the  newspapers 
of  the  time  are  inserted,  together  with  tw^o  out  of  several 
successive  series  of  resolutions  passed  by  the  New  Jersey 
Annual  Conference: 

The  following  is  taken  from  the  "  Newark  Daily  Adver- 
tiser:" 

Newark  Wesleyan  Institute. — The  following  extract  is  from  a 
Boston  paper  of  last  week.  It  shows  the  opinion  of  an  intelligent 
Now  Englander  respecting  an  institution  that  has  sprung  up  in  our 
midst:  ''The  best-arranged  edifice  and  system  of  education  for  aca- 
demical training  that  has  ever  come  under  our  notice  is  the  one  bearing 
the  title  at  the  head  of  this  article,  and  situated  in  the  beautiful  city 
of  Newark,  N.  J.  A  new  and  imposing  edifice  has  been  constructed 
after  the  most  approved  model,  and  with  every  modern  improvement 
and  facility  for  health  and  comfort.  As  Providence  evidently  designs, 
it  is  prepared  for  the  simultaneous  education  of  both  sexes,  and  yet  is 
defended  from  all  the  objections  that  attach  to  the  large  public  acade- 
mies of  this  character.  The  faculty  is  large,  and  of  a  superior  charac- 
ter. The  principal,  Sidera  Chase,  A.M.,  has  been  for  a  number  of 
years  in  charge  of  a  i>opular  ladies' academy  in  Middletown,  Conn.,  and 
commences  his  new  relation  with  a  well-earned  reputation  for  scholar- 
ship, tjict  in  teaching,  and  amenity  of  manners." 
16 


362  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

The  Kew  York  correspondent  of  the  "Pittsburg  Chris- 
tian Advocate  "  spoke  of  the  institution  as  follows  : 

A  week  or  two  since  we  enjoyed  the  pleasure  of  a  visit  to  the  Newark 
Wesleyan  Institute.  Rev.  D.  P.  Kidder,  our  excellent  Sunday-school 
editor,  had  much  to  do  in  getting  up  this  institution.  We  wish  to  call 
the  attention  of  our  friends  to  its  plan  and  arrangement,  especially 
those  who  are  planning  seminaries  in  our  Church.  We  regard  it  as  a 
model  institution,  embracing  a  better  system,  combining  more  advan- 
tages, and  at  a  less  expense,  than  any  other  institution  we  have  ever 
seen,  and  they  are  not  few  in  number. 

The  whole  expense  of  the  institution,  including  lots  in  the  city  of 
Newark,  building  and  furniture,  will  not  exceed  $15,000,  and  yet  the 
building  is  so  arranged  that  four  hundred  students  may  be  accommo- 
dated and  instructed ;  and  that,  too,  with  no  more  teachers  than  half 
that  number  of  students  usually  require. 

Equally  favorable  notices  were  published  in  the  "  Ladies' 
Repository,"  of  Cincinnati,  and  the  "  Sunday-School  Advo- 
cate," of  New  York. 

Action  of  the  New  Jersey  Conference. 

April  24,  1850. 
Your  committee  take  pleasure  in  expressing  their  satisfaction  at  the 
high  degree  of  prosperity  enjoyed  by  the  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute. 
It  has  been  communicated  to  us  that  at  the  present  time  the  institution 
not  only  has  three  hundred  scholars  enrolled  upon  its  lists,  but  also  a 
large  number  of  applicants  for  whom  in  the  proper  departments  it  has 
not  room.  In  view  of  the  powerful  influence  for  good  which  such  an 
institution,  conducted  on  Christian  principles,  cannot  fail  to  exert,  we 
hail  it  as  a  valuable  auxiliary  in  the  great  cause  of  Christian  education, 
and  wish  it  continued  success. 

April  17,  1856. 

Whereas,  The  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute,  during  the  eight  years  of 
its  existence,  has  demonstrated  a  large  capacity  for  usefulness;  and, 

Whereas,  From  its  central  position  in  the  northern  half  of  the  Confer- 
ence, and  to  a  large  and  growing  population  it  appears  extremely  desir- 


The  Newark  Wesley  an  Institute.  363 

able  that  its  original  design  should  be  carried  out,  particularly  in  the 
erection  of  a  boarding  department ;  therefore, 

Resolved^  1.  That,  should  the  trustees  of  the  Newark  Wesleyan  Insti- 
tute resolve  on  endeavoring  to  increase  the  accommodations  of  the 
institution  by  erecting  a  boarding  department  or  otherwise,  the  Con- 
ference will  cordially  sanction  the  enterprise. 

Besohedy  2.  That  should  the  trustees  for  this  purpose  deem  it  proper 
to  appoint  an  Rgent  for  the  sale  of  stock  or  scholarships,  or  for  the 
collection  of  funds,  the  Conference  will  recommend  such  agent  to  the 
co-operation  and  support  of  our  churches  and  people  generally,  and  es- 
pecially in  the  northern  half  of  its  territory. 

Elected  as  representatives  of  stock — M.  E.  Ellison,  C.  S.  Vancleve ; 
appointed  visitors — I.  W.  Wiley,  D.  D.  Lore,  J.  T.  Crane. 

EMBARRASSMENTS. 

It  seems,  indeed,  to  have  been  a  cruel  fate  that  allowed  an 
institution  of  such  demonstrated  capacity  and  promise  of 
usefulness  to  struggle  with  embarrassments  of  any  kind. 
Yet  it  came  to  pass  that  for  lack  of  a  comparatively  small 
amount  of  funds  it  was  compelled  to  forfeit  its  well-earned 
position,  and  surrender  its  corporate  existence.  That  this 
was  not  done  without  earnest  efforts  to  avoid  that  catastro- 
phe is  shown  by  the  following  extracts  from  an  appeal  made 
especially  to  the  Methodist  Episcopal  churches  of  Newark, 
which  extracts  also  embody  an  official  statement  of  certain 
portions  of  its  history. 

On  November  26,  1855,  a  called  meeting  of  the  pastors 
and  official  members  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  churches  of 
Newark  was  held,  at  which  the  trustees  of  the  Newark  Wes- 
leyan Institute  made  a  full  statement  of  its  affairs  and  claims 
for  pecuniary  relief.  That  statement  in  full  stands  recorded 
in  the  Journal  of  the  institute,  but  it  can  only  be  represented 
liere  by  brief  extracts: 

The  institute  was  incorporated  with  a  capital  stock  of  $20,000.  This 
sum  was  deemed  a  low  estimate  for  the  necessary  expenses  of  the  under^ 


364  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

taking.  But  it  was  found  necessary  to  commence  operations  with  about 
half  of  the  desired  amount.  Up  to  the  present  time  the  amount  received 
on  stock  account  is  $12,067.  The  following  expenditures  have  been 
made:  for  site,  $3,851  88;  building,  fences,  etc.,  $13,210  91;  furniture, 
$1,601  30;  interest,  $760  93;  insurance,  $60;  total,  $18,485  02. 

The  average  cost  for  teachers'  salaries  and  current  expenses  has  been 
about  $5,000.  This  sum  has  been  generally  met  by  our  assets  from  tui- 
tion. Had  there  been  no  losses  from  bad  debts,  and  no  expense  for 
interest,  the  excess  of  tuition  receipts  would  have  been  nearly  sufficient 
to  cover  all  expenses.  But  as  affairs  have  turned  out,  the  result  of  our 
operations  for  the  last  three  years  has  been  a  gradual  increase  of  debt, 
so  that  now  the  liabilities  of  the  institution  are  not  far  from  $8,000. 

A  careful  review  of  the  history  of  the  institute  for  the  seven  years 
of  its  actual  operation  shows  conclusively  the  important  facts,  first, 
that  such  an  institution  was  greatly  needed;  second,  that  it  has  been 
very  useful.  On  these  points  it  may  be  remarked  that  the  voluntary 
movement  by  which  this  institute  was  called  into  existence  had  a  very 
obvious  effect  in  awakening  greater  activity  and  decided  improvement 
in  the  public  schools  of  the  city.  At  the  same  time  the  institute 
has  furnished  facilities  for  education  altogether  above  the  range  of 
the  public  schools.  It  has  been  instrumental  in  fitting  several  young 
men  for  college,  in  graduating  several  young  ladies,  and  in  giving  in- 
struction to  large  numbers  of  youth  now  engaged  in  the  active  duties 
of  life. 

It  has  at  times  been  blessed  with  the  awakening  influences  of  the 
Divine  Spirit,  and  pupils  of  both  sexes  have  been  converted  while  en- 
joying its  privileges.  Indeed,  several  of  its  students  have  already  gone 
forth  as  ministers  of  the  word  of  life,  both  in  our  own  country  and  in 
regions  far  remote. 

Few  educational  institutions  have,  in  the  same  length  of  time,  at- 
tained a  higher  rank.  Indeed,  the  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute  is  already 
widely  known  and  thoroughly  commended,  having  again  and  again, 
by  the  best  of  judges,  been  pronounced  a  model  school. 

When  the  institution  opened,  Methodism  in  Newark  was  compara- 
tively feeble.  We  had  but  three  churches  besides  the  German,  and 
about  one  thousand  two  hundred  members.  Now  we  have  eight 
churches,  with  two  thousand  five  hundred  members,  and  two  thousand 


The  J^ewark  Wesleyan  Institute.  365 

two  hundred  and  twenty-two  Sunday-school  scliolars,  irrespective  of 
German  and  mission  Sunday-school  scholars, 

Witiiout  entering  into  further  details,  the  trustees  find  themselves 
compelled  to  inform  their  friends  that  a  period  has  arrived  when  some 
decided  movement  must  be  made  in  favor  of  the  Newark  Wesleyan  In- 
stitute, or  its  future  cr»ntinuance  will  be  thrown  into  jeopardy.  Our 
own  convictions  are,  that  the  objects  of  the  institution  are  of  such  im- 
portance as  to  fully  justify  large  sacrifices  in  order  to  maintain  and  per- 
petuate it.  But  such  an  undertaking  cannot  be  accomplished  without 
a  concurrence  of  views  and  a  union  of  effort  upon  a  somewhat  extended 
scale.  A  literary  institution  in  the  interests  of  the  Church  should  not, 
and  cannot  of  right,  be  dependent  on  individuals,  but  should  be  placed 
in  a  position  in  which  the  whole  Church  will  feel  an  interest  and  respon- 
sibility in  it.  To  secure  this  is  what  we  ardently  desire,  and  what  we 
regard  as  every  way  practicable. 

Within  the  northern  half  of  the  New  Jersey  Conference  are  about 
fifteen  thousand  members  of  our  Church,  and  four  times  the  number  of 
its  friends  having  no  other  literary  institution  under  their  control  or 
patronage,  save  the  Pennington  Seminary,  on  the  opposite  side  of  the 
State.  To  the  majority  of  this  large  and  growing  population  this  in- 
stitute is  centrally  situated.  At  the  same  time  there  is  an  equal  Meth- 
odist population  in  New  York  and  Brooklyn,  a  share  of  whose  patron- 
age might  be  easily  secured  had  we  boarding  accommodations. 

The  question  now  arises,  whether  measures  may  not  be  taken  to  enlist 
the  zeal  and  concentrate  the  energies  of  the  Conference  and  its  friends, 
in  conjunction  with  the  local  strength  of  Newark,  to  enlarge,  maintain, 
and  per|)etuate  the  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute.  If  this  be  done,  it  is 
certain  that  Newark  must  take  the  lead,  and  show  an  example  of  be- 
nevolence and  zeal  in  the  cause  of  education  that  will  challenge  the 
sympathy  and  co-operation  of  the  surrounding  community.  For  estab- 
lishing a  strong  academic  institution  in  this  central  region  of  the 
Church  and  country  we  now  have  the  great  advantages  of  a  choice  lo- 
cation, a  good  building,  an  organized  faculty,  a  superior  system  of  in- 
struction, and  a  large  numlx?r  of  j)upils  already  in  training.  These  are 
results  that  cannot  be  secured  for  any  new  enterprise  without  the  lapse 
of  years,  together  with  an  expenditure  of  money  and  of  effort  far  greater 
than  will  be  necessary  to  place  this  institute  in  an  independent  position. 


366  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

To  the  future  Newark  Conference  this  institution  will  be  very  cen- 
tral, and,  if  it  be  sustained  and  enlarged,  there  will  be  no  difficulty  in 
concentrating  upon  it  the  Conference  support  and  patronage.  If,  how- 
ever, the  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute,  after  so  fair  a  beginning,  shall  be 
suffered  to  go  down  or  pass  out  of  our  hands,  whatever  place  may  be 
selected  for  a  Conference  seminary  this  will  not.  Indeed,  such  an  event 
would  be  a  serious  hinderance  to  the  establishment  of  any  similar  insti- 
tution in  this  region  for  the  next  quarter  of  a  century. 

At  the  end  of  these  and  many  more  similar  arguments  a 
perfect  unanimity  of  sentiment  prevailed,  and  the  most  cor- 
dial resolutions  were  passed  in  favor  of  maintaining,  enlarg- 
ing, and  perpetuating  the  institution.  Unhappily,  however, 
after  trial,  the  subscriptions  fell  short,  and  the  trustees  felt 
compelled  to  sell  out  the  property  in  1857  for  the  sum  of 
$18,000.  With  that  sum  they  liquidated  their  obligations 
and  closed  up  the  transactions  of  the  corporation  with  prompt- 
ness and  honor.  For  long,  faithful,  and  disinterested  services 
in  that  trusteeship  the  names  of  the  following  laymen  de- 
serve to  be  passed  down  to  posterity  with  the  highest  com- 
mendation, namely :  John  Hartshorne,  David  Campbell,  Will- 
iam G.  Lord,  D.  M.  FitzGerald,  J.  B.  Pinneo,  James  Jack- 
son, and  Benjamin  J.  Wood,  while  several  others  honorably 
filled  shorter  terms  of  service. 

SUCCESSION. 

It  is  a  gratifying  fact  that,  although  sold  out  by  its  orig- 
inal stockholders,  the  Newark  Wesleyan  Institute,  so  far 
from  becoming  extinct,  has  had  continuous  succession  as  an 
active  agency  of  Christian  education.  Its  succession  has,  in 
fact,  been  twofold,  first  in  the  Newark  Academy^  which 
purchased  and  still  occupies  its  property ;  and,  second,  in  the 
Centenary  Collegiate  Institute,  of  the  JSTewai'k  Conference, 
located  at  Hackettstown,  N.  J. 


The  Newark  Wesley  an  Institdte.  3G7 

Newark  Academy. 

The  Newark  Academy  was  founded  as  far  back  as  1702. 
Its  location  for  many  years  had  been  on  Broad  Street,  on  the 
Bite  now  occupied  by  the  United  States  post-office  and  gov- 
ernment building.  In  the  year  1857  it  was  transferred  to 
the  more  eligible  site  previously  occupied  by  the  Newark 
Wesleyan  Institute,  where  it  has  been  continued  ever  since 
in  successful  operation  as  an  institution  for  boys  and  young 
men.  In  the  year  closing  in  June,  18^5,  it  had  one  hundred 
and  eighty  students. 

Its  successive  principals  have  been  Kev.  F.  A.  Adams, 
Messi-s.  S.  A.  Fan-and,  Ph.D.,  C.  M.  Harrison,  and  C.  M. 
Davis,  with  Major  Hopkins  as  an  associate  principal. 

At  the  present  time,  as  for  the  last  ten  years,  the  institu- 
tion is  under  the  able  management  of  Dr.  Farrand,  who 
temporarily  retired  from  the  principalship  in  1865. 

Its  course  of  study,  beginning  with  the  English  branches, 
includes  all  that  is  necessary  for  the  most  thorough  prepara- 
tion for  college,  the  scientific  school,  or  for  business  life. 
The  institution  now  enjoys  an  enviable  reputation  throughout 
the  State,  and  in  States  adjoining.  Best  of  all,  the  moral 
and  religious  influence  of  the  school  in  molding  the  char- 
acters of  its  pupils  forms  its  most  prominent  characteristic. 

Centenary  Collegiate  Institute. 

The  history  of  the  second  line  of  succession  of  the  New- 
ark Wesleyan  Institute  commenced  with  the  action  of  the 
Newark  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  in 
1806,  when,  after  due  consideration,  it  was  voted  to  "  recom- 
mend the  erection  of  an  academic  institute  that  shall  be  an 
honor  to  the  Church  and  a  blessing  to  future  genertions." 


Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

In  September,  1859,  the  corner-stone  of  the  Centenary 
Collegiate  Institute,  at  Ilackettstown,  was  laid  by  Bishop 
Simpson.  In  September,  1874,  the  institution  was  dedicated 
and  opened  for  school  work,  under  the  presidency  of  Eev. 
George  H.  Whitney,  D.D.  Dr.  Whitney  has  held  the  of- 
fice of  president  from  tliat  time  to  the  present. 

The  building  was  erected  at  a  cost  of  nearly  $200,000,  and 
was  considered  the  most  complete,  and  costly,  in  all  respects 
of  any  that  had  been  built  within  the  connection  devoted  to 
**  seminary  work."  Since  the  opening  about  $15,000  addi- 
tional have  been  expended  in  improvements,  such  as  a  gym- 
nasium for  young  men,  a  gymnasium  for  j^oung  ladies,  bath- 
rooms, apparatus,  chemical  and  philosophical,  a  room  for 
library,  reading-room,  and  museum.  Besides,  several  very 
valuable  cabinets,  etc.,  have  been  presented  by  friends.  Wliile 
from  the  start  the  school  has  always  been  well  patronized, 
during  the  past  four  years  the  building,  though  accommodat- 
ing nearly  two  hundred  students,  has  been  crowded,  and  more 
than  one  hundred  have  been  refused  admittance  from  lack  of 
room. 

The  institution  was  opened  with  a  debt  of  $45,000.  During 
the  first  two  years  the  debt  was  reduced  to  $36,000.  Six  years 
later  Mr.  George  I.  Seney  voluntarily  oflTered  Dr.  Whitney 
$15,000  if  the  balance  of  the  debt  should  be  raised.  The 
offer  was  accepted,  and  within  a  few  months  the  $36,000 
were  canceled,  and  not  a  dollar  of  debt  has  since  been  added, 
all  recent  improvements  having  been  paid  for  as  soon  as 
completed. 

Too  much  could  hardly  be  said  of  the  high  intellectual, 
moral,  and  religious  standard  tliat  lias  been  continuously 
maintained  by  this  important  institution,  or  of  its  brilliant 
prospects  for  long-continued  usefulness. 


Boston  University.  o69 


PART    III. 


CHAPTER  I. 


FOUNDING  AND  EARLIEST  HISTORY  OF  THE    SCHOOL  OP 
THEOLOGY  OF  BOSTON  UNIVERSITY. 

BY  PRESIDE^er   WILLIAM   P.    WARRBN,   S.T,D.,    LL.D. 

For  the  origin  of  this  mother  of  our  Theological  Seminaries 
we  must  go  back  to  the  first  Centennial  Jubilee  of  Universal 
Methodism.  In  the  spring  of  1833,  the  year  of  that  jubilee, 
a  "  Convention  of  ministers  and  members  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church  in  New  England  "  was  called  "  to  consider 
the  expediency  of  establishing  a  Methodist  theological  insti- 
tution." It  iifet  on  the  24:th  of  April,  in  the  Bromfield 
Street  Church,  Boston,  and,  after  a  two-days'  session,  issued 
an  "  Address  to  the  Ministers  and  Members  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church  in  New  England,"  earnestly  recommending 
the  proposed  measure.  Centenary  offerings  were  asked  for 
the  purpose  of  founding  the  contemplated  school.  The  ad- 
dress filled  about  three  columns  of  the  local  church  organ, 
*'  Zion's  Herald,"  and  produced  a  profound  impression. 
!Many,  it  is  true,  were  not  prepared  to  welcome  the  new 
movement;  but,  with. few  exceptions,  the  leading  minds, 
l)oth  in  tlie  ministry  and  laity,  favored  it. 

To  continue  and  complete  the  work  thus  inaugurated  the 
convention  proposed  the  formation  of  a  society,  in  which 
tlie  adjacent  Annual  Conferences  should  be  equall}^  repre- 
sented, and  which  should  serve  as  their  conunoii  organ  in 

IG* 


370  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

locating,  organizing,  and  endowing  the  new  institution.  It 
solicited  at  the  hands  of  the  Conferences  the  appointment  of 
committees  of  five  to  co-operate  with  a  like  committee  from 
the  Convention  in  the  organization  of  such  a  society,  and, 
committees  having  been  appointed  a  few  weeks  after  by  the 
"New  England  and  New  Hampshire  Conferences,*  the  three 
delegations  met  in  Bromfield  Street  Church,  August  28 
and  29,  and  founded  the  "Wesley  Institute  Association." 
There  were  subscribed  on  the  spot  $1,800,  another  address 
immediately  issued,  and  tlie  agitation  proceeded  most  favor- 
ably. A  special  column  was  assigned  to  the  new  school  in 
the  authorized  form  for  centenary  subscription  papers,  and 
in  some  cases,  as  at  Providence,  it  was  found  that  of  the  of- 
ferings and  subscriptions  a  larger  part  was  devoted  to  this 
object  than  to  any  other. 

In  the  spring  of  1840  both  Conferences  again  took  favor- 
able action,  in  which  they  were  joined  by  the  Maine.  All 
passed,  among  others,  the  following  resolution  : 

"  I^esolved,  That  this  Conference  approve  of  the  design  of 
the  Wesley  Institute  Association  to  establish  the  contemplated 
institution  in  New  England  on  the  general  model  of  the  Wes- 
leyan  School  in  London  [finally  located  at  Eichmond],  and 
that  we  will  sustain  the  association,  and  heartily  co-operate 
w^ith  the  friends  of  the  enterprise  in  the  accomplishment  of 
their  important  object." 

Each  of  the  Conferences  elected  their  five  delegates  to  rep- 
resent them  in  the  association.  In  the  Maine  Conference, 
60  great  was  the  unanimity,  that  not  one  voice  was  raised 
against  the  movement.  Over  $1,300  were  subscribed  on 
the  spot,  and  ten  young  men  presented  themselves  as  candi- 
dates for  admission  so  soon  as  the  school  should  be  opened. 

*  Tlic  Maine  was  the  only  otlier  Conference  at  that  time  in  New  England. 


Boston  UNivERSiroii^jOH^^^^^^'      371 

Meantime  several  favorable  offers  of  locations  had  been 
received,  one  from  representatives  of  Boston  and  vicinity, 
one  from  Newbury,  Vt.,  and  one  from  Billerica,  Mass.  The 
offer  from  the  citizens  of  Newbury  was  of  a  site  and  build- 
ings equal  to  those  of  the  Newbury  Seminary,  on  condition 
that  $15,000  were  pledged  toward  the  endowment  of  the 
new  school.  In  a  meeting  of  the  association,  held  on  the  4tli 
of  November,  1840,  the  proposition  from  Newbury  was  ac- 
cepted, a  board  of  trustees  elected,  and  financial  agents  ap- 
pointed to  solicit  additional  funds.  At  the  same  meeting 
Rev.  John  Dempster,  A.M.,  of  the  Black  Eiver  Conference, 
was  elected  professor  of  systematic  theology,  and  Rev.  John 
W.  Merrill,  A.M.,  then  president  of  M'Kendree  College, 
pi'ofessor  of  sacred  literature.  This  was  the  first  theological 
faculty  in  the  history  of  American  Methodism. 

Unfortunately  the  finances  of  the  new  enterprise  would 
not  admit  of  an  immediate  commencement,  and  the  profess- 
01-8  elect  remained  at  their  former  posts.  The  financial 
agents  having  regular  pastoral  charges,  could  do  but  little  for 
the  cause ;  and  thus  the  spring  of  1841  found  the  school  still 
unopened.  Meantime  the  friends  and  representatives  of 
Wesleyan  University  began  to  agitate  the  question  of  carry- 
ing the  theological  institution  to  Middletown,  Conn.,  and 
making  it  a  department  of  the  university.  A  recommenda- 
tion to  that  effect  was  carried  through  the  Providence,  New 
England,  and  Maine  Conferences ;  and  when  the  Wesley 
Institute  Association  met  in  Plymouth,  N.  II.,  September  15, 
they  deemed  it  expedient,  in  view  of  this  Conference  action, 
and  the  report  that  $*20,000  had  been  offered  for  a  building 
in  case  the  school  could  go  to  Middletown,  to  rescind  their 
former  action  by  which  the  location  had  been  fixed  in  New- 
bury.    They  appointed  a  committee  to  confer  with  the  au- 


372  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

tliorities  at  Middletown,  with  full  power  to  transfer  and  make 
over  to  the  university  all  funds,  notes,  subscriptions,  etc., 
held  by  the  association  for  the  benefit  of  the  projected  school. 
They  even  gave  authority  to  this  committee  to  make  any 
changes  or  modifications  in  the  constitution  of  the  society 
requisite  to  the  legal  and  effectual  carrying  out  of  this  plan  ! 
As  but  six  members  of  the  association  were  present  at  the 
meeting,  this  remarkable  action  was  afterward  sharply  criti- 
cised. On  the  20th  of  October,  however,  the  committee 
met  in  Boston,  and,  after  conference  with  Dr.  Bangs,  then 
president  of  the  university,  transferred  all  centenary  and 
other  funds  and  pledges  in  possession  of  the  association  to 
Wesleyan  University,  on  two  simple  conditions :  first,  that 
the  new  theological  department  should  be  opened  at  once ; 
and,  second,  that  previous  collegiate  education  should  not  be 
required  for  admission.  Thereafter  all  protests  against  the 
action  of  the  meeting  at  Plymouth  were  useless,  and,  its  mis- 
sion apparently  accomplished,  the  Wesley  Institute  Associa- 
tion disappeared  from  view.  The  university  redeemed  its 
pledge  by  announcing  in  l^Tovember  the  opening  of  a  biblical 
department.  Nevertheless,  no  separate  theological  curricu- 
lum being  provided  independent  of  the  regular  collegiate 
one,  and  no  new  instructor  being  added  to  the  faculty,  it  was 
soon  seen  that  nothing  had  been  accomplished  toward  the 
establishment  of  the  desired  ministerial  school. 

But  while  the  funds  of  the  original  centenary  organization 
had  taken  this  unexpected  course,  its  ideas  and  spirit  and 
plans  had  kept  to  the  original  line.  They  were  at  tliis  very 
time  working  themselves  out  at  Newbury,  the  originally  de- 
termined location.  Newbury  Seminary,  at  that  time  one  of 
onr  strongest  educational  institutions,  contributed  at  the  very 
outset  not  a  little  to  the  centenary  movement  in  favor  of  es- 


Boston  University.  373 

tablishing  a  theological  school.  Many  of  the  best  arguments 
in  the  Chnrch  papers  were  dated  from  that  literary  center. 
Its  bid  as  a  location  for  the  projected  school  was  the  earliest 
and  best.  To  prepare  the  way  for  its  coming  the  Theo- 
logical Society  of  Newbury  Seminary  was  organized  Sep- 
tember 11,  1840.  By  constitutional  provision  the  principal 
of  the  seminary,  if  a  member  of  the  New  Hampshire  Con- 
ference,* was  to  be  president,  the  stationed  preacher  vice- 
president.  This  placed  Professor  Osmon  C.  Baker,  A.M. 
(the  late  Bishop),  at  the  head  of  the  new  organization.  The 
object  of  the  society  was  the  ministerial  training  of  its  mem- 
bers under  the  oversight  of  these  experienced  officers.  For 
a  time  its  exercises  consisted  of  essay-writing,  criticism,  dis- 
cussion, preaching,  etc.  Encouraged,  however,  by  the  Wes- 
ley Institute  Association's  acceptance  of  Newbury  as  the  lo- 
cation of  the  theological  school.  Professor  Baker  and  his 
associates  added,  in  tlie  spring  of  1841,  an  extended  course 
of  lectures  and  theological  text-book  instruction.  On  rec- 
ommendation of  the  Conference  the  department  was  still 
further  developed  by  the  addition  of  facilities  for  the  study 
of  Hebrew.  Rev.  Henry  W.  Adams,  A.B.,  a  graduate  of 
Middletown,  was  the  instructor  in  this  branch.  The  follow- 
ing year  Professor  Willett  resigned  his  chair  in  Wesley  an 
University  and  accepted  the  professorship  of  Hebrew  in  what 
was  now  called 

The  Newbury  Biblical  Institute. 

A  few  montlis  later  Professor  Willett  established  a  theo- 
logical organ,  known  as  the  "Newbury  Biblical  Magazine." 
Preparations  were   made  to  erect  a  hall  for  the  theological 
students.      Some   of  the  materials  were   purchased,  but  it 
*  The  Vermont  Conference  was  not  set  off  jiniil  1844. 


374  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

beino:  tlibnsrlit  wiser  to  wait  the  more  definite  action  of  the 
Annual  Conferences,  the  work  was  postponed.  For  imme- 
diate use  a  portion  of  the  existing  seminary  building,  which 
had  previously  been  occupied  by  the  ladies,  was  set  apart  for 
the  institute,  and  on  the  29th  of  September,  1843,  formally 
dedicated.  Professor  Baker  delivered  the  dedicatory  address, 
his  theme  being  "The  Call  and  Qualification  of  the  Christian 
Minister."  At  this  time  twenty  students  were  in  attendance 
upon  the  institute. 

In  1844  Professor  Baker  resigned  his  principalship  of  the 
seminary  and  professorship  in  the  institute  to  enter  upon  the 
regular  work  of  the  ministry.  Not  long  after  a  committee 
of  Newbury  brethren  visited  the  Boston  Preachers'  Meeting 
to  secure  their  co-operation  in  inviting  the  Rev.  John  Demp- 
ster, at  this  time  stationed  in  New  York,  to  the  chair  vacated 
by  Professor  Baker.  The  Boston  brethren  consented  ,to 
unite  in  the  call,  on  condition  that  the  school  should  be 
made  a  general  one  for  all  the  New  England  Conferences, 
and  that  its  future  location  shold  be  left  to  the  determination 
of  the  Conferences  or  their  representatives.  These  conditions 
were  acceded  to,  and  Mr.  Dempster  entered  upon  his  duties 
at  Newbury.  To  carry  out  the  new  programme  loyally,  the 
trustees  of  the  Newbury  Biblical  Institute  met  in  May,  1845, 
at  Winchester,  the  seat  of  the  New  Hampshire  Conference, 
and  requested  Professor  Dempster  to  visit  the  other  New 
England  Conferences  as  their  agent,  and  seek  their  concur- 
rence in  tliree  propositions :  1.  That  the  patronizing  Confer 
enccs  should  all  have  an  equal  representation  in  the  boai'd  of 
trustees ;  2.  That  the  location  of  tlie  school  should  be  deter- 
mined by  the  Conferences  or  by  their  trustees ;  and,  3.  That 
$37,000,  in  addition  to  the  $12,000  already  subscribed  for 
the  Newbury  Institute,  should  be  raised  as  an  endowment. 


Boston  University.  375 

The  New  England,  New  Hampsliire,  and  Providence  Con- 
ferences readily  accepted  these  propositions,  and  appointed, 
as  requested,  five  trustees  each,  to  act  with  the  trustees  of 
the  Newbury  Biblical  Institute.  This  was  a  resumption  of 
the  original  plan,  set  aside  by  the  irregular,  if  not  illegal, 
action  of  the  Plymouth  session  of  the  Wesley  Institute  Asso- 
ciation. The  constitution  of  that  association  had  provided 
that  the  supervision  of  the  future  institution  should  be  in 
the  hands  of  the  Conferences,  each  appointing  five  of  its 
governing  board.  It  had  also  left  the  decision  of  the  ques- 
tion of  location  to  a  body  (the  association  itself)  in  which 
each  Conference  was  equally  represented.  About  the  same 
sum  had  likewise  been  fixed  upon  at  the  outset  as  necessary 
for  the  first  endowment  of  the  school.  Thus  the  original 
movement  of  the  centenary  year,  recovering  itself  from  all 
losses  and  delays,  held  once  more  on  its  way. 

About  this  time  the  trustees  of  the  Newbury  Biblical 
Institute  discovered,  that  by  the  terms  of  their  charter  so 
considerable  an  increase  of  their  number  as  that  contem- 
plated in  their  proposition  to  the  Conferences,  was  impracti- 
cable. With  commendable  magnanimity  they  therefore  ac- 
cepted the  recommendation  of  the  Vermont  Conference,  and 
transferred  their  work  to  the  hands  of  the  trustees  appointed 
by  the  Conferences.  Dr.  Dempster  took  the  field  as  finan- 
cial agent,  and  the  thus  re-organized  institute  of  Newbury 
became  thereafter 

The  Methodist  General  Biblical  Institute. 

The  task  of  raising  $37,000  at  that  time  for  such  a  pur- 
pose was  no  easy  one.  Even  Dr.  Dempster  failed.  lie  ditl 
his  utmost  for  a  full  year,  even  visiting  Great  Britain,  and 
soliciting  from  friends  of  American  Methodism  there,  but 


376  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

still  tlie  sum  total  fell  vastly  short  of  the  desired  amount. 
In  the  spring  of  184Y,  however,  an  eligible  offer  of  location 
and  building  having  been  received  from  citizens  of  Concord, 
N.  H.,  the  trustees  accepted  the  same,  elected  a  faculty,  and 
on  the  1st  of  April  re-opened  the  school  with  three  professors 
and  seven  students.*  A  charter  was  procured  from  the 
General  Court  of  Kew  Hampshire  (approved  July,  13, 1847), 
and  thus  the  idea  of  the  centenary  convention  of  1839  en- 
tered upon  a  new  stage  of  its  destined  realization. 

In  explanation  of  the  slowness  of  the  movement  up  to 
this  point,  many  things  should  be  remembered.  First,  it 
required  time  to  create  a  public  sentiment  in  favor  of  such 
an  innovation  upon  the  past  practice  of  Methodism  with 
respect  to  ministerial  training.  This,  however,  was  not  so 
great  a  hinderance  as  the  general  poverty  of  our  people.  A 
generation  ago  our  cause  w^as  in  most  places  in  New  England 
in  all  the  weakness  of  its  first  beginnings.  Yery  few  could 
do  more  than  meet  the  ordinary  calls  of  charity  and  of 
church  work.  Again,  it  was  the  period  of  the  great  anti- 
slavery  agitation,  which  led  to  the  Wesleyan  secession  in 
New  England,  and  to  the  rending  of  the  entire  denomination 
into  two  vast  fragments.  It  was,  furthermore,  the  time  of  the 
great  Millerite  frenzy  of  1843,  and  its  most  damaging  reac- 
tions thereafter.     Many  of  the  warmest  friends  of  the  school 

*  The  following  were  the  heroic  professors  who  sacrificed  the  honors  nnd 
emoluments  of  the  best  pulpits  of  their  day  to  build  up,  amid  incredible  obstacles, 
the  Concord  Biblical  Institute:  John  Dempster,  D.D.  (years  of  service,  1847- 
1852);  Osraon  C.  Baker,  D.D.,  afterward  Bishop  (1841-1852)  ;  Cli.^rles  Adams, 
D.D.  (1847-1849);  Stephen  M.  Vail,  D.D.  (1849-1867):  John  W.  Merrill,  D.D. 
(1854-1867);  and  David  Patten,  D.D.  (1854-1867)— the  last  also  serving  in  the 
new  faculty  in  Boston.  Isaac  Rich,  Esq.,  the  Hon.  Jacob  Sleeper,  and  the 
Hon.  Lee  Claflin,  later  tlie  founders  of  the  Boston  University,  were  the  lirst 
large  pecuniary  benefactors  of  the  school. 


Boston  University.  377 

had  to  firive  their  best  thonf^ht  and  work  to  the  defense  of 
tlie  people  against  this  popular  delusion.  In  addition  to  all 
these  things,  the  support  of  newlj  established  academies,  and 
the  endowment  of  Wesleyan  University,  then  scarce  a 
decade  old  and  greatly  embarrassed,  were  connectional  bur- 
dens of  special  urgency,  taxing  to  the  utmost  the  benevo- 
lence of  the  Church.  Under  all  the  circumstances,  the  chief 
wonder  is  that  the  project  of  founding  a  theological  semi- 
nary was  not  at  an  early  period  entirely  abandoned. 

The  success  of  the  school  in  its  new  location  was  such  as  to 
meet  all  reasonable  expectation.  Considering  the  means  and 
circumstances  of  the  institution,  a  most  honorable  record  was 
achieved.  It  graduated  two  hundred  and  ten  students,  an 
average  of  over  ten  per  annum.  It  educated  in  part  over 
^ve  hundred  and  seventy  ministers,  an  average  of  nearly 
thirty  a  year.  These  men  are  scattered  through  twenty-live 
^r  thirty  of  our  Annual  Conferences,  at  the  head  of  foreign 
missions,  in  prominent  educational  institutions,  and  even  in 
the  Wesleyan  ministry  of  British  America  and  the  mother 
country.  "  One  third  of  the  New  England  Conference,"  said 
a  writer  in  1866,  "  and  two  thirds  of  the  New  Hampshire, 
are  from  this  institution,  while  twenty -three  more  are  in  the 
Providence  Conference.  To  take  Concord  out  of  New  En- 
gland," he  adds, "  would  be  to  ruin  New  England  Methodism." 

During  all  these  years  the  school  was  constantly  on  the 
verge  of  bankruptcy.  Its  chief  dependence  was  the  pittance 
annually  collected  by  the  members  of  the  eight  patronizing 
Conferences.  To  facilitate  the  work  of  securing  an  endow- 
ment, as  well  as  to  obtain  the  advantage  of  a  metropolitan 
location,  the  question  of  removal  to  Boston  was  frequently 
discussed.  Once  and  again  the  trustees  and  patrons  were  de- 
terred from  action,  first,  by  the  financial  crises  of  the  country, 


378  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

then  bj  the  repeated  disasters  by  fire  which  overtook  our 
academy  at  Wilbraham.  The  approach  of  the  centenary  of 
American  Methodism,  however,  in  1866,  afforded  just  the 
needed  opportunity.  Liberal  subscriptions  were  solicited 
and  obtained,  a  new  board  of  trustees  organized  under  a 
Massachusetts  charter,  and,  in  1867,  the  scliool,  with  all  its 
trusts  and  traditions,  was  transferred  to  Boston.  Such  was 
the  origin  of 

The  Boston  Theological  Seminary, 

under  which  new  name  the  school  was  carried  on  from  1867 
till  1871-72.  The  prosperity  of  the  re-organized  institution 
during  this  period  is  shown  by  the  following  annual  totals  of 
students  in  attendance :  thirty-two,  forty-four,  fifty-nine, 
eighty-one,  ninety-four.  During  this  time,  under  a  new 
faculty,  many  of  the  ablest  and  most  learned  of  American 
divines,  of  various  evangelical  denominations,  were  employed 
as  lecturers  extraordinary,  missionary  instruction  was  intro- 
duced, a  library  fund  collected,  two  scholarships  founded, 
and  an  annual  report  printed,  now  of  no  inconsiderable  his- 
toric value.  During  the  year  1871  the  seminary  was  legally 
transferred  to  the  trustees  of  the  newly  founded  Boston  Uni- 
versity— the  first  completely  organized  university,  with  all 
the  faculties,  in  universal  Methodism.  Since  that  time  au- 
thentic accounts  of  its  growth  and  work  may  be  found  in 
the  published  annual  reports  of  the  president  of  Boston 
University,  and  in  the  quadrennial  reports  of  the  trustees  of 
the  university  to  the  General  Conferences  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church,  printed  in  the  Journals  of  said  Con- 
ferences. 

Briefly  sketched,  such  is  the  story  of  the  rise  and  early 
fortunes  of  our  earliest  institution  for  the  training  of  Chris- 


Boston  University.  379 

tian  ministers.  Its  foundei*s  fouglit  the  battle  for  all  that 
were  to  follow.  Its  relation  to  the  institutions  at  Evanston 
and  Madison  is  almost  directly  parental.  To  found  the  for- 
mer Dr.  Dempster  resigned  his  position  of  honor  and  influ- 
ence at  Concord,  and  went  forth  to  recommence  the  struggle 
of  his  life  in  the  great  West.  Happily  Providence  had  bet- 
ter things  in  store  for  him.  A  saintly  widow  consecrated 
her  ample  fortune  to  the  work,  and  he  was  privileged  to  or- 
ganize, upon  a  financial  basis  such  as  he  had  never  dreamed 
of  before,  the  Garrett  Biblical  Institute.  The  founder  of 
the  Drew  Theological  Seminary  was  a  parishioner  of  the 
same  heroic  pioneer  during  the  years  immediately  preceding 
liis  exchange  of  the  pulpit  for  the  championship  of  the  New 
England  Theological  School.  The  prominence  of  the  name 
of  Dimiel  Drew  upon  Dempster's  earliest  subscription  book, 
shows  when  and  how  that  intelligent  interest  in  ministerial 
education  was  cultivated  which  culminated,  in  1866,  in  the 
munificent  foundation  at  Madison.  It  is  also  a  pleasing 
coincidence,  that  the  first  two  anniversary  orators  at  Concord 
afterward  became,  in  precisely  the  same  order,  the  first  two 
presidents  of  Drew  Theological  Seminary. 


380  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTEE  n. 

GARRETT    BIBLICAL    INSTITUTE. 

BY   HON.   JUDGE   GRANT  GOODRICH. 

In  1853  there  was  but  one  theological  school  in  the  Meth- 
odist Episcopal  Church.  This  was  founded  through  the 
labors  of  Rev.  John  Dempster,  D.D.,  at  Concord,  New 
Hampshire.  The  Methodists  of  America  were  slow  to  ap- 
prove such  schools,  and  it  was  felt  that  special  safeguards, 
providing  against  apprehended  dangers,  were  necessary. 
Mrs.  Eliza  Garrett,  of  Chicago,  by  the  death  of  her  husband, 
had  become  possessed  of  a  large  property  in  the  city  of 
Chicago,  and,  being  without  children  and  desirous  of  advanc- 
ing the  Kedeemer's  kingdom,  determined  to  devote  two 
thirds  of  her  property  to  such  uses  as  seemed  most  likely  to 
promote  that  object.  She  sought  the  advice  of  various 
friends  in  whose  judgment  she  had  confidence,  but  none  of 
their  suggestions  met  her  entire  approval.  In  consulting 
ariotlier  friend,  her  attention  was  called  to  the  founding  of  a 
theological  school.  That,  she  replied,  had  been  the  subject 
of  lier  own  thought ;  the  pious  and  heroic  men  who  had 
spread  the  Gospel  with  such  wonderful  success  over  a  wide 
and  sparsely  settled  country,  among  a  people  largely  deprived 
of  the  means  of  education,  deserved  and  should  receive  all 
honor;  but  the  more  settled  condition  of  the  people  would 
lead  to  higher  education  and  intelligence,  and  they  would  tlien 
demand  a  ministry  of  higher  culture,  and  to  the  training  of 
such  a  ministry  she  would  devote  her  property.  In  Decem- 
ber, 1853,  a  will  was  drawn  to  carry  this  design  into  effect. 


Gaerett  Biblical  Institute.  381 

Several  coincidences  indicate  that  her  inspiration  to  this 
noble  purpose  was  from  on  high.  About  this  time  Rev.  D.  P. 
Kidder,  D.D.,  being  informed  of  her  intention,  visited  and  en- 
couraged iier.  Also,  in  the  succeeding  winter,  Dr.  Dempster, 
in  pursuance  of  a  plan  to  found  such  a  school  in  the  West, 
visited  Chicago,  and,  on  learning  the  purpose  of  Mrs.  Gar- 
rett, was  introduced  to  her,  and,  on  consultation,  said  :  "  The 
will  of  the  Lord  is  clear,  I  have  been  directed  of  him,  though 
I  knew  it  not."  He  desired  to  commence  at  once,  but  the 
debts  of  the  estate  could  not  be  paid  under  two  years,  and 
until  that  time  Mrs.  Garrett  could  give  no  aid.  Dr.  Demp- 
ster was  not  content  to  wait,  and  in  December,  1853,  he 
called  a  meeting  of  a  few  friends  of  the  enterprise,  and  pro- 
posed, if  they  would  furnish  a  building  and  §1,600  a  year, 
he  would  become  responsible  for  all  other  expenses.  This 
they  promised  to  do,  and  in  January,  1854,  a  wooden  build- 
ing, adequate  to  accommodate  forty  students,  was  finished, 
and  the  school  was  opened,  under  the  charge  of  Rev.  John 
Dempster,  D.D.,  Rev.  William  Goodfellow,  A.M.,  and  the 
Rev.  William  P.  Wright,  A.M.  The  first  term  opened  with 
four  and  closed  with  sixteen  students.  The  direction  was 
confided  to  a  committee  until  the  commencement  of  the  term, 
in  1856,  when  the  government  and  property  were  passed 
over  to  the  trustees  named  in  the  charter.  In  November, 
1855,  its  founder,  after  a  brief  illness,  passed  from  earth  to 
heaven,  with  the  exclamation  upon  her  dying  lips,  "  Bless 
the  Lord,  O  my  soul ! " 

The  provisions  of  the  charter,  and  the  action  of  the  Gen- 
eral Conference  on  the  petition  of  the  trustees,  effectually 
insure  fidelity  to  the  doctrines  and  discipline  of  the  Church. 
The  charter  requires  three  of  the  trustees  to  be  ministers  and 
three  laymen,  all  to  be  members  of  tlie  Methodist  Episcopal 


382  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Church,  and  to  be  elected  by  the  Kock  Kiver  Conference. 
The  policy  of  so  limited  a  number  of  trustees,  and  of  con- 
fining the  election  to  the  Kock  Kiver  Conference,  has  been 
questioned  ;  but  we  are  certain  that  the  history  of  the  insti- 
tution will  justify  the  wisdom  of  these  provisions.  Uniform 
experience  demonstrates  that  a  small  board  of  trustees  is 
more  efficient  than  a  large  one.  They  should  always  be  se- 
lected for  their  sound  judgment,  intelligent  devotion  to  the 
Church,  and  ability  to  give  that  large  amount  of  time  and 
personal  attention  to  their  duties  which  can  alone  insure 
success.  While  thus  securing  efficiency  in  the  conduct  of 
financial  affairs,  the  charter  gives  the  patronizing  Confer- 
ences a  supervision  of  the  institution,  by  the  appointment 
of  two  visitors  from  each,  who  have  the  right  to  participate 
in  the  examination  of  the  students,  to  inquire  into  the 
teaching,  and  to  submit  such  advice  to  the  trustees  as 
they  deem  proper.  These  supervisory  powers  are  practi- 
cally more  conserving  and  controlling  than  one  or  two  votes 
in  a  large  body  of  trustees.  The  charter  shows  what  careful 
provisions  against  doctrinal  errors  and  misteaching  have 
been  made.  Kegarding  the  school  as  connection al,  and  that 
all  possible  safeguards  might  be  thrown  around  it,  the  trust- 
ees, before  the  election  of  any  professors,  except  Dr.  Demp- 
ster, petitioned  the  Bishops  for  their  counsel  in  organizing 
the  institution,  the  selection  of  its  teachers,  and  the  general 
plan  of  its  management.  This  petition  was  referred  to  the 
General  Conference  of  1856,  which  recommended  that  the 
Bishops  act  as  an  advisory  committee  to  counsel  the  trustees 
of  the  Garrett  Biblical  Institute,  and  such  other  similar  in- 
stitutions as  may  exist,  but  disapproved  the  undue  multipli- 
cation of  such  schools. 

In  accordance  with  such  action,  the  Bishops  advised  that 


Garrett  Biblical  Institute.  383 

no  teacher  be  elected  without  their  approval,  and  that  every 
teacher,  before  entering  upon  his  duties,  should  sign  a 
declaration  of  his  approval  of  the  doctrines  and  discipline 
of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  These  recommenda- 
tions were  approved  by  the  trustees,  and  have  been  care- 
fully observed. 

In  1865  the  number  of  students  had  so  increased  that  the 
original  building  became  inadequate  for  their  accommoda- 
tion, and,  as  a  pious  woman  had  founded  the  school,  an 
appeal  was  made  to  the  women  of  the  Church  to  erect  a 
more  commodious  building,  to  be  dedicated  as  a  memorial  to 
Barbara  Heck.  The  Rev.  James  S.  Smart  was  secured  as 
agent,  and  his  labors  were  so  successful  that  on  the  12th  of 
July,  1866,  the  corner-stone  of  a  handsome  brick  building 
was  laid,  which  was  finished,  furnished,  and  dedicated,  July 
4,  1867,  at  a  cost  of  $57,000.  Of  the  cost  of  the  building, 
however,  $25,000  remained  unprovided  for,  which  the  trust- 
ees were  compelled  to  assume.  This  edifice  ^Heck  Hall)  con- 
tains a  chapel,  library,  recitation  rooms,  and  fifty-seven  rooms 
for  students.  These  accommodations  have  heretofore  proved 
sufficient,  but  the  institution  has  so  grown  in  favor  with  the 
Church,  and  the  number  of  students  has  so  multiplied,  that 
an  additional  building,  specially  for  chapel,  library,  and  lect- 
ure rooms,  is  greatly  needed.  It  is  hoped  the  friends  of  min- 
isterial education  will  speedily  furnish  the  necessary  funds ; 
for  it  is  the  fixed  policy  of  the  trustees  to  sell  no  part  of  the 
endowment  property,  and  not  to  encumber  it  for  current 
expenses,  or  for  the  erection  of  buildings. 

The  financial  history  of  the  institute  has  been  one  of 
marked  vicissitude,  but  under  the  unremitting  labors  and 
skillful  management  of  the  trustees,  the  generous  liberality 
of  the  Church,  and  the  blessing  of  God,  it  has  been  one  of 


384  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 

marvelous  success.  The  endowment  left  by  Mrs.  Garrett 
was  in  real  estate,  most  of  it  in  the  business  part  of  Chicago. 
"When  it  passed  from  the  executors  of  Mrs.  Garrett  to  the 
trustees  it  was  mostly  unproductive.  The  trustees  put  as 
much  of  it  as  possible  under  ground  rents,  in  which  they 
were  satisfactorily  successful;  but  the  financial  embarrass- 
ments of  1857  compelled  the  lessee  of  the  most  valuable  part 
to  give  up  his  lease  in  the  succeeding  year.  In  1860  the 
wigwam  in  which  Mr.  Lincoln  was  nominated  was  erected 
upon  it  at  a  comparatively  nominal  rent.  This  building  was 
afterward  purchased,  and  converted  into  business  tenements, 
but  was  burned  in  1867.  In  1870  a  block  of  brick  stores 
was  built  upon  it  at  a  cost  of  $65,000,  which,  with  $25,000 
assumed  in  the  erection  of  Heck  Hall,  and  $2,000  paid  on 
the  purchase  of  the  wigwam,  constituted  an  indebtedness  of 
$92,000.  This  building,  with  two  other  brick  stores,  was 
swept  away  in  the  great  fire  of  October,  1871,  leaving  most 
of  the  property  not  only  unproductive,  but  encumbered  with 
the  whole  debt  of  $92,000.  This  great  calamity  left  the 
financial  affairs  of  the  institution  in  a  most  deplorable  condi- 
tion. But  by  the  generous  liberality  of  the  entire  Church 
in  its  contributions  for  the  relief  of  the  suffering  brethren  of 
Chicago,  the  institute  realized  as  its  share  $62,500,  and  the 
trustees,  as  the  only  means  of  paying  the  debt  and  securing 
the  support  of  the  school,  erected  in  1872  a  larger  building  at 
a  cost  of  $110,000.  For  the  ensuing  year  the  property 
yielded  an  income  of  $25,000  ;  but  the  panic  of  1873  so  bank- 
rupted lessees  and  depressed  rents  that  in  1878  we  had  run 
behind  $1,500,  and  the  estimated  deficiency  for  the  ensuing 
year  was  $5,000.  The  trustees  called  the  faculty  together, 
and  having  submitted  the  financial  condition,  informed  them 
that  they  had  resolved  to  sell  none  of  the  property  and  to 


Garrett  Biblical  Institute.  385 

contract  no  liabilities  for  tlie  current  expenses  of  the  school ; 
tliat  the  only  way  it  could  be  continued  was  by  an  appeal  to 
the  Cliurch  for  relief;  and  if  that  failed,  the  school  must  be 
closed  until  its  endowment  could  be  relieved  of  incumbrance. 
A  meeting  of  the  friends  of  the  institution  was  then  called, 
and  it  was  resolved  to  make  an  appeal  to  the  Church  to  can- 
cel the  indebtedness  and  increase  the  endowment.  The  fac- 
ulty generously  contributed  one  fourth  of  their  salaries ;  but 
little  progress  was  made  until,  by  appointment  of  the  Rock 
River  Conference,  in  1879,  the  services  of  the  Rev.  W.  C. 
Dandy,  D.D.,  were  procured.  He  entered  upon  the  work 
with  a  thorough  appreciation  of  its  importance,  and  prose- 
cuted it  with  an  intelligent  zeal,  an  earnest  but  kind  persist- 
ency which  gave  him  a  wonderful  success,  not  only  in  obtain- 
ing pecuniary  relief,  but  in  awakening  an  interest  in  behalf 
of  ministerial  education  in  the  Church  at  large.  Among  the 
numerous  gifts  obtained  during  this  period  was  the  noble 
benefaction  of  Mi*s.  Cornelia  Miller,  of  Iowa,  of  $30,000  for 
the  endowment  of  the  chair  of  practical  theology.  Through 
Dr.  Dandy's  labors  and  the  fortunate  sale  of  some  riparian 
rights  we  are  able  to  make  the  gratifying  announcement 
to  the  Church  that  all  the  debts  of  Garrett  Biblical  Institute 
have  been  paid.  Reliable  progress  is  also  being  made  toward 
a  handsome  increase  of  the  endowment,  and  the  income  will 
be  adequate  to  meet  all  current  expenses,  unless  an  unforeseen 
depreciation  in  rents  should  occur.  It  is  earnestly  hoped, 
that  as  the  wants  of  the  school  are  constantlv  increasinor,  the 
worthy  example  of  Mrs.  Miller  will  be  followed  by  others, 
that  thus  the  institute  may  be  placed  fully  abreast  with  all 
the  requirements  of  the  age. 

Recognizing,    as   we   do,  these   signal    manifestations   of 

divine  favor  to  this  school  of  the  prophets,  we  renew  to  its 
17 


386  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

present  and  future  governors  and  teachers  the  exhortation 
which  was  addressed  by  the  committee  who  organized  Garrett 
Biblical  Institute,  and  directed  the  first  years  of  its  history, 
when  they  surrendered  its  control  to  the  charter  trustees, 
*^  That  learning  however  profound,  human  wisdom  however 
deep,  the  skill  of  logic  and  the  grace  of  eloquence  how- 
ever polished,  without  the  kindled  fires,  the  baptismal  unc- 
tion of  the  Holy  Ghost,  are  vanities  and  worse  than  vanities, 
in  fitting  the  minister  of  the  Gospel  of  Christ  for  his  holy 
calling.  ...  Let  all  learning  and  science,  however  varied 
and  profound,  be  regarded  as  valueless  to  the  commissioned 
of  Heaven,  only  so  far  as  they  arm  him  with  more  potency  to 
wield  the  mighty  truths  and  unfold  the  saving  mysteries  of 
the  Gospel  of  Christ.  Let  Christ,  the  Divine  Redeemer,  and 
his  vicarious  sacrifice,  liis  atoning  and  purifying  blood,  be 
ever  recognized  and  proclaimed  as  the  only  source  of  salvar 
tion  to  a  fallen  world.  In  dread  of  the  final  judgment  we 
adjure  you  to  fail  not." 

Trustees. — Hon.  Grant  Goodrich,  president;  Orrington 
Lunt,  secretary  and  treasurer;  Luke  Hitchcock,  D.D.,  Eev. 
E.  H.  Gammon,  William  Deering,  R.  D.  Sheppard,  D.D. 

Official  Board  of  Counsel. — The  Bishops  of  the  Meth- 
odist Episcopal  Church. 

Faculty. — Henry  B.  Ridgaway,  D.D.,  president;  Pro- 
fessors Miner  Raymond,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Charles  F.  Bradley, 
B.D.,  Milton  S.  Terry,  D.D.,  Charles  W.  Bennett,  D.D. ; 
Robert  L.  Cumnock,  A.M.,  elocution ;  Rev.  Milton  S.  Yail, 
A.B.,  Greek. 

Among  the  retired  professors,  Henry  Bannister,  D.D.,  and 
Francis  C.  Hemenway,  D.D.,  both  deceased,  each  gave  twen- 
ty-five of  tlie  best  years  of  life  to  tliis  institution,  Daniel  P. 
Kidder,  D.D.,  fifteen  years,  and  Bishop  Ninde  nine  years. 


Garketit  Biblical  Institute.  387 

Alumni. — A  class  of  six  was  graduated  from  this  school  in 
1858.  Each  year  since  has  added  to  the  list  of  the  alumni. 
Of  the  three  hundred  and  twenty-seven  graduates,  the  follow- 
ing have  become  distinguished  in  the  various  fields  of  labor 
assigned  them : 

J.  Watson  Waugh,  D.D.,  North  India ;  James  S.  Chadwick, 
D.D.,  New  York ;  Charles  H.  Fowler,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  Bishop 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church ;  Darius  H.  Muller,  D.D.,  East 
Ohio;  P.  T.  Wilson,  M.D.,  North  India;  James  H.  Mess- 
more,  D.D.,  North  India ;  N.  H.  Axtell,  D.D.,  Rock  River ; 
O.  J.  Cowles,  D.D.,  Kansas;  George  E.  Strobridge,  D.D., 
New  York ;  John  Boucher,  D.D.,  Indiana ;  J.  C.  Hart- 
zell,  D.D.,  Louisiana ;  Joshua  H.  Rigby,  D.D.,  Upper  Iowa ; 
Wilbur  F.  Yocum,  D.D.,  president  Fort  Wayne  College; 
W.  H.  H.  Adams,  D.D.,  president  Illinois  Wesleyan  Uni- 
versity ;  Nathan  Bur  wash,  S.T.D.,  professor  of  theology  in 
V'ictoria  University ;  Spencer  Lewis,  B.D.,  China  Mission ; 
Edward  L.  Park,  A.M.,  B.D.,  president  of  Simpson  Col- 
lege, and  many  others. 


388  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTER  III. 

DREW    THEOLOGICAL     SEMINARY. 

BY   HENRY  A.   BUTTZ,   D.D. 

The  Drew  Theological  Seminary  is  the  result  of  the 
Centennial  celebration  of  American  Methodism  in  1866.  The 
General  Conference  of  1864,  in  its  arrangements  for  the 
Centennial,  expressed  the  desire  that  the  educational  interests 
of  tlie  Church  should  share  largely  in  the  contributions  of 
the  people. 

The  necessity  for  a  forward  movement  in  educational 
work,  especially  in  the  department  of  ministerial  education, 
was  felicitously  expressed  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Abel  Stevens,  in 
1865. 

In  his  "  Centenary  of  American  Methodism  "  he  thus  writes 
of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  :  "  It  should  especially 
enlarge  its  means  of  ministerial  education.  It  has  done  a 
great  work  in  the  mere  conquest  of  the  popular  prejudice 
against  theological  schools.  It  has  provided  (as  we  have 
seen)  two  such  institutions — one  in  the  north-east,  and  one  in 
the  north-west ;  it  needs  at  least  three  more  immediately — 
one  in  the  middle  east,  one  in  the  middle  west,  and  one  on 
the  Pacific  coast.  It  should  have  them  at  latest  within  five 
years,  and  its  proposed  Centenary  Fund  will  probably  enable 
it  to  provide  them  even  earlier." 

In  the  year  1866,  Mr.  Daniel  Drew,  a  layman  of  New 
York  city,  proposed  to  give  $500,000  for  the  purpose  of 
founding,  in  or  near  New  York  city,  a  theological  seminary 
for  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.     This  most  generous 


Drew  Theological  Seminary.  389 

offer  was  received  with  profound  satisfaction  and  deep  grati- 
tude by  the  Church,  and  plans  to  put  into  effect  this  purpose 
of  Mr.  Drew  were  at  once  considered. 

The  first  matter  which  engaged  his  attention  was  the  selec- 
tion of  a  suitable  location.  After  a  careful  investigation  of 
the  various  places  which  were  suggested,  it  was  decided  to  es- 
tablish the  institution  at  Madison,  N.  J.,  about  twenty-seven 
miles  from  the  city  of  New  York.  The  site  chosen  was  the 
valuable  property  known  as  the  "  Forest,"  belonging  to  the 
Gibbons  estate.  It  is  a  most  beautiful  and  healthful  spot, 
about  three  hundred  and  seventy-live  feet  above  tide-water, 
and  admirably  adapted,  in  all  respects,  for  the  purposes  of  an 
institution  of  learning. 

On  the  grounds  was  the  stately  building  known  as  the 
"  Mansion."  It  was  found  admirably  adapted  to  the  needs  of 
the  school,  its  rooms  large  and  high,  having  ante-rooms  suit- 
able for  studies  and  offices  for  the  professors;  it  also  afforded 
ample  room  for  the  library,  which  was  to  be  one  of  the  finest 
theological  reference  libraries  in  the  country. 

The  ninety-five  acres  of  land  that  comprised  the  tract  af- 
forded fine  locations  for  the  residences  of  the  faculty  and  for 
the  dormitories.  The  grounds  "are  laid  out  with  great  taste 
and  attractiveness,  the  original  model  being  one  of  the  finest 
of  the  English  baronial  estates." 

Over  $270,000  were  spent  by  Daniel  Drew  in  the  pur- 
chase of  these  grounds,  the  erection  of  the  necessary  addi- 
tional buildings,  and  in  securing  the  valuable  collections  of 
books  that  now  compose  the  library. 

The  seminary  was  incorporated  by  the  Legislature  of  New 
Jersey  on  the  12th  of  February,  18G8.  Tlie  purposes  of  the 
institution  were  quite  clearly  outlined  in  the  charter,  which 
in  its  second  section  is  as  follows: 


390  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

2.  And  !)€  it  enacted,  That  the  objects  and  purposes  of  the  said  cor- 
poration are  the  establishment,  maintenance,  and  support  within  the 
State  of  New  Jersey  of  a  theological  faculty  and  seminary,  and  of  theo- 
logical instruction  and  education  therein,  under  the  direction  and 
supervision  of  the  General  Conference  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church  in  the  United  States,  and  in  consonance  with  the  doctrines  and 
discipline  of  the  said  Church,  with  power  to  confer  on  graduates  of 
said  seminary  proper  degrees  in  theology,  and  to  exercise  the  preroga- 
tive of  a  university  in  conferring  honorary  degrees  in  theology  upon 
clergymen,  with  power  also  to  oi^anize  faculties  of  arts,  law,  literature, 
and  medicine  at  such  time  as  the  said  corporation  may  see  fit,  and  to 
that  end  to  appoint  professors  in  said  faculties,  and  through  them  to 
provide  instruction  in  the  arts,  law,  literature,  and  medicine,  and  to 
confer  degrees  in  the  same,  and  to  use  and  exercise  all  the  powers  and 
functions  of  a  university;  and  said  corporation  is  hereby  authorized 
and  empowered,  whenever  it  shall  desire  so  to  do,  to  change  its  cor- 
porate name  to  that  of  the  Drew  University;  said  change  to  be  effected 
by  filing  in  the  office  of  the  Secretary  of  State,  of  this  State,  a  cer- 
tificate signed  by  the  president  of  the  board  of  trustees  for  the 
time  being,  by  order  of  said  board,  of  their  intention  so  to  change  said 
name,  and  upon  the  filing  of  said  certificate  said  corporation  shall 
thenceforward  be  known  by  the  said  name  of  the  Drew  Univercity; 
p7'ovidedy  that  said  change  of  name  shall  not  in  any  wise  affect  the  title 
to  any  of  the  property  of  the  corporation ;  but  said  corporation  shall 
have  and  enjoy  all  its  franchises,  property,  rights,  and  privileges,  and 
have  succession  in  all  respects  as  if  its  name  had  not  been  changed. 

It  thus  appears  that  the  school  was  founded  to  promote  a 
higher  training  for  the  candidates  for  the  Methodist  minis- 
try. While  all  the  powers  of  a  university  were  conferred 
upon  the  trustees  and  faculty  by  their  charter,  they  have  ad- 
hered thus  far  closely  to  its  primary  object.  None  are  ad- 
mitted from  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  except  those 
who  are  local  preachers,  or  who  are  recommended  by  a  Quar- 
terly Conference  as  suitable  persons  to  study  for  the  minis- 
try.    Students  from  other  denominations  are  only  admitted 


Drew  Theological  Seminary.  391 

on  receiving  satisfactory  credentials  of  their  standing  in  tlie 
Cluirch  from  which  tliey  come.  Thus  the  ministerial  and 
religious  aspect  of  the  school  is  strictly  guarded  at  the  door 
of  enti-ance. 

The  seminary  was  formally  opened  on  the  6th  of  Novem- 
ber, 18C7.  The  exercises  were  held  in  the  morning  in  the 
Presbyterian  church,  w^hich  that  society  had  generously 
tendered  for  that  purpose,  and  in  the  afternoon  in  the  Man- 
sion on  the  seminary  grounds,  known  as  Mead  Hall,  a 
name  given  to  it  in  recognition  of  the  maiden  name  of  Mrs. 
Drew.  The  large  assembly  present,  including  Bishops,  cler- 
gymen, and  laymen,  with  many  ladies,  showed  a  wide-spread 
interest  in  the  occasion.  The  faculty  present  at  the  time 
consisted  of  John  McClintock,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  president,  and 
professor  of  practical  theology ;  Bernard  II.  Nadal,  D.D., 
professor  of  historical  theology.  In  carrying  out  the  plan  of 
the  trustees,  two  members  of  the  faculty,  a  professor  of  exe- 
getical  theology,  and  a  professor  of  systematic  theology,  with 
such  additional  instruction  as  might  be  needed,  remained  to 
be  secured.  The  faculty,  as  constituted  at  the  opening  of 
the  second  seminary  year,  in  the  autumn  of  1868,  was  as 
follows : 

Rev.  John  McClintock,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  president,  and  pro- 
fessor of  practical  theology ;  Rev.  B.  H.  Nadal,  D.D.,  professor 
of  historical  theology ;  Rev.  R.  S.  Foster,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  pro- 
fessor of  systematic  theology;  James  Strong,  S.T.D.,  pro- 
fessor of  exegetical  theology ;  Rev.  Henry  A.  Buttz,  M.A., 
'adjunct  professor  of  Greek ;  James  II.  Worman,  M.A., 
librarian. 

In  the  spring  of  1869  the  fii-st  class  (numbering  nine)  was 
graduated  from  the  seminary,  and  from  that  time  until 
now  the  institution  has  gone  steadily  forward  in  its  work  of 


392  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

training  young  men  for  the  ministry  of  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church.  Up  to  the  present  time  some  three  hundred 
and  fifty  graduates  have  gone  into  the  ministry,  and  in  addi- 
tion a  large  number,  who  were  not  able  to  complete  the  full 
course.  They  are  in  the  East  and  West,  the  JSTorth  and 
South,  and  the  school  has  furnished  a  large  and  successful 
working  force  in  the  various  mission  fields  of  the  Church. 
In  the  brief  period  of  its  history,  Drew  Theological  Seminary 
has  trained  about  one  thirtieth  of  the  present  itinerant  min- 
istry of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church. 

In  Febniary,  1870,  the  first  president,  Rev.  Dr.  Jolm 
McClintock,  died,  and  in  the  summer  of  the  same  year  Dr. 
iNadal  was  also  removed  by  death.  They  were  held  in  high- 
est esteem,  and  their  loss  was  deeply  deplored,  not  only  by 
the  friends  of  the  seminary,  but  by  the  whole  Church. 

The  Rev.  Dr.  Foster  became  the  successor  of  Dr.  McClin- 
tock in  the  presidency,  and  Dr.  J.  F.  Hurst  succeeded  Dr. 
I^adal  in  the  chair  of  historical  theology.  At  a  later  period, 
Dr.  D.  P.  Kidder  became  professor  of  practical  theology, 
and  Rev.  Henry  A.  Buttz,  professor  of  New  Testament 
exegesis. 

On  the  election  of  Dr.  Foster  to  the  episcopacy,  Dr.  J.  F. 
Hurst  was  elected  president,  which  office  he  held  until  his 
election  to  the  episcopacy,  in  1880.  Bishop  Hurst  w^as  suc- 
ceeded in  his  professorship  by  Dr.  George  R.  Crooks,  and 
Dr.  Kidder,  who  resigned  the  professorship  of  practical  the- 
ology in  1880,  was  succeeded  by  Dr.  S.  F.  Upham.  In 
the  same  year  Dr.  Henry  A.  Buttz  became  president  of  the 
institution. 

The  faculty,  as  now  constituted,  is  as  follows : 

Rev.  Henry  A.  Buttz,  D.D.,  president,  and  professor  of 
New  Testament   exegesis ;   James  Strong,  S.T.D.,  LL.D., 


Drew  Theological  Seminary.  393 

professor  of  exegetical  theology ;  Rev.  John  Miley,  D.D., 
LL.D.,  professor  of  systematic  tlieology ;  Rev.  George  R. 
Crooks,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  professor  of  historical  theology ;  Rev. 
Samuel  F.  Upham,  D.D.,  professor  of  practical  theology,  and 
librarian  ;  Professor  J.  P.  Silvernail,  A.M.,  special  instructor 
in  elocution. 

Li  the  interval  between  these  periods,  instruction  in  the 
various  departments  has  been  furnished  by  Revs.  S.  L.  Bald- 
win, D.D.,  J.  T.  Gracey,  D.D.,  H.  C.  Whiting,  Ph.D.,  C.  R. 
Barnes,  M.A.,  S.  Parsons,  M.A.,  W.  L.  Hoagland,  M.A., 
W.  W.  Martin,  M.A. 

In  the  spring  of  1873  a  great  financial  disaster  fell  upon 
the  seminary.  Mr.  Daniel  Drew,  the  generous  founder  of 
the  institution,  failed  in  business,  and  hence  he  was  unable  to 
pay  the  endowment  which  he  had  pledged  for  its  suppoi-t. 

Mr.  Drew  had,  however,  before  his  misfortunes,  done  a 
work  wliich  will  bear  his  name  and  influence  for  coming 
generations.  He  had  purchased  the  property,  he  had  put 
upon  it  extensive  improvements,  he  had  supported  the  semi- 
nary for  nine  years,  expending  upon  it  about  $500,000. 
He  never  ceased  to  deplore  his  inability  to  sustain  the  semi- 
nary. Tlie  shock  to  the  trustees  and  faculty  and  friends  was 
very  great,  but,  not  daunted  by  the  difficulties,  the  president 
of  the  seminary.  Dr.  Hurst,  and  the  trustees  and  friends, 
came  boldly  forward,  and  the  school  was  not  compelled 
to  diminish  its  working  force  or  to  abridge  its  work  for  a 
Fingle  day. 

Led  by  the  indomitable  energy  of  Dr.  Hurst,  the  trustees 
and  friends  devoted  themselves  to  the  task  of  restoring  its 
endowment.  By  the  spring  of  1880  the  work  was  practi- 
cally accomplished,  and  Dr.  llurst,  whose  energy  and  wisdom 

had  done  so  much  toward  securing  this  result,  had  tlio  satis- 
17* 


394  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

faction  of  seeing,  before  his  elevation  to  the  episcopacy, 
the  institution  restored  to  more  than  its  original  financial 
strength. 

The  library  of  the  seminary  from  the  first  attracted  the 
attention  of  the  management  of  the  seminary.  A  nucleus 
of  a  fine  theological  library  was  formed  before  the  endow- 
ment was  swept  away,  and  it  lias  been  largely  increased  from 
tiine  to  time.  It  is  especially  rich  in  Methodist  literature, 
and  in  hymnology.  The  trustees  have  determined  on  the 
erection  of  a  new  fire-proof  library  building,  of  stone,  with 
reading-room  and  all  modern  appliances,  for  the  preservation 
of  their  treasures,  and  the  work  has  already  begun.  When 
this  is  completed  the  library  facilities  of  the  seminary  will  be 
among  the  best  in  the  country.  Its  text- books  in  bibliog- 
raphy and  lexicography,  botli  general  and  special,  in  English, 
German,  and  French,  are  quite  complete.  Tlie  Greek  and 
Latin  Fathers,  Abbe  Migne's  edition,  make  the  set  of  patris- 
tics  perfect,  while  in  exegetical  theology  the  collected  works 
of  the  Eeformers,  and  the  Codices,  largely  enhance  the  value 
of  tlie  library  to  the  student  and  literary  man,  to  whom,  in 
the  future,  much  more  than  in  the  past,  is  this  library  to 
become  the  literary  Mecca  of  our  Church  historians  and 
our  theologians.  Its  collection  of  histories  connected  with 
Methodism,  used  by  Dr.  Abel  Stevens  in  the  preparation  of 
his  works,  and  the  Creamer  collection  of  hymnology,  are 
priceless.  To  these  are  added  the  library  of  the  late  Dr. 
McClintock,  and  the  collection  of  the  late  Rev.  John  D. 
Blain,  which,  with  the  valuable  contributions  made  by  a 
number  of  generous  friends,  constitute  the  Drew  Library, 
which,  in  connection  with  the  equally  accessible  library  of 
the  professors,  numbers  about  twenty-five  thousand  volumes. 

The  seminary  is  devoted  to  the  interests  of  the  Methodist 


Drew  Theological  Seminary.  39[i 

Eiscopal  Church,  and  offers  abundant  facihties  for  the 
thorough  education  of  its  ministry. 

Its  trustees  are  elected  by  the  General  Conference;  the 
faculty  is  elected  by  the  trustees,  on  the  nomination  of  the 
Board  of  Bishops ;  and  the  doctrines  and  discipline  of  Meth- 
odism are  taught  and  enforced. 

Within  twenty-seven  miles  of  New  York  city,  very  ac- 
cessible to  the  metropolis,  and  to  the  Book  and  Mission 
Rooms  of  the  Church,  Drew  Theological  Seminary  opens  its 
doors  to  welcome  the  coming  ministry  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church,  and  to  prepare  them,  with  the  divine 
blessing,  for  their  sacred  work. 


396  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 


PART     IV. 


CHAPTER  I. 


CENTRAL    TENNESSEE    COLLEGE. 

BY   PRESIDENT  J.    BRADEN,  D.D. 

In  1865  the  Missionary  Society  of  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church  intrusted  to  Bishop  Clark  $10,000  for  the 
establishment  of  a  Freedmen's  school  somewhere  in  the 
South-west.  In  the  early  autumn  of  that  year  he  authorized 
Eev.  John  Seys,  D.D.,  and  Eev.  O.  O.  Knight,  to  open  a 
Freedmen's  school  in  Clark's  Chapel,  Kashville,  Tenn.  The 
work  of  preparation  was  intrusted  to  Mr.  Knight,  who  with 
his  own  hands  prepared  seats  and  other  furniture. 

The  first  teachers  were  Messrs.  Seys  and  Knight,  assisted 
by  Mrs.  Mary  Murphy,  Mrs.  Julia  North,  Misses  O.  D.  Bar- 
ber, Julia  Evans,  Nettie  and  Mary  Mann,  and  a  little  later 
Miss  Emily  E.  Preston.  All  these  assistants  were  colored 
persons,  with  but  very  limited  education,  mostly  acquired 
after  the  issue  of  the  Emancipation  Proclamation.  The  pu- 
pils were  of  all  ages  and  sizes.  Children,  parents,  and  grand- 
parents were  in  the  same  classes.  They  were  poorly  clad, 
homeless  wanderers  from  the  plantations  of  their  old  mas- 
ters, and  now  sheltered  in  the  barracks  of  the  army,  or  the 
abandoned  cellars,  garrets,  or  houses  of  those  who  had  fled 
through  apprehension  of  arrest  by  the  government.  Never 
did  teachers  have  more  earaest  pupils.  The  w^hole  chapel, 
including  basement,  was  soon  crowded,      While  the  other 


Central  Tennessee  College.  397 

teacliei*s  taught  the  spclHng-book,  primer,  and  easy  readers, 
Dr.  Seys  endeavored  to  impart  to  the  numerous  exhortei-s 
and  local  preachers  some  knowledge  of  the  doctrines  of  the 
Bible,  and  of  the  Discipline  of  tlie  Church.  The  following 
specimen  of  the  preaching,  quite  common  then,  was  heard 
by  the  writer  soon  after  his  arrival  in  Nashville,  in  1867 : 

"  My  brethering,  I  ha'n't  got  no  book  larnin',  book  'ligion. 
I  has  de  ole  cornfield  'ligion,  and  you'll  find  de  tex'  some- 
whar'  in  de  lids  ob  de  Bible,  and  it  am  dis :  '  Let  me  die  de 
death  ob  de  righteous  man,  and  let  my  last  end  be  like 
hisen.' " 

This  boast  of  the  superiority  of  the  "cornfield 'ligion" 
was  to  propitiate  the  large  part  of  his  hearers,  who  were  as 
ignorant  as  himself.  This  preacher  soon  after  learned  to 
read  the  Bible ;  this,  of  course,  changed  his  estimate  of  the 
superiority  of  the  "cornfield"  to  the  book  religion. 

During  the  spring  of  1866,  Bishop  Clark  having  deter- 
mined to  locate  a  permanent  school  at  Nashville,  a  board  of 
trustees  was  appointed,  and  a  charter  for  a  college  was 
secured.  This  was  accepted  by  the  Freedmen's  Aid  Society, 
which  undertook  to  support  the  teachers,  and  otherwise  aid 
the  institution.  This  work  has  gone  on  for  nineteen  years. 
Hundreds  of  young  men  have  been  trained  for  the  ministry, 
scores  for  the  practice  of  medicine,  and  thousands  for  teaching 
in  the  public  and  private  schools  of  the  land.  The  church 
becoming  entirely  too  small,  the  school,  in  September,  1866, 
was  moved  into  a  building  known  as  the  "  Gun  Factory." 
This  building  was  erected  by  the  Confederates  iis  an  armory, 
but  the  near  approach  of  the  Union  forces,  after  the  fall  of 
Fort  Donelson,  stopped  the  work,  and  led  to  the  abandon- 
ment of  the  building.  It  was  turned  over  to  the  school 
trustees  by  the  Freedmen's  Bureau.     The  government  fitted 


398  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

lip  tlie  rooms,  the  trustees  provided  desks  at  an  expense  of 
over  $2,000.  The  services  of  Dr.  Sejs  and  Mr.  Knight  were 
required  in  other  fields.  Rev.  W.  B.  Crichlaw  was  appointed 
pastor  of  Clark  Chapel,  and  at  the  same  time  took  charge  of 
the  school,  with  the  teachei^s  before  named  as  assistants. 
Over  eight  hundred  pupils  were  enrolled  for  this  year, 
mostly  in  the  primary  grades.  A  few  had  advanced  to  the 
study  of  grammar,  geography,  and  perhaps  physiology. 
The  ages  of  the  scholars  were  becoming  more  like  those  of 
ordinary  schools.  The  government  having  ceased  the  sup- 
ply of  rations,  the  parents  learned  that  freedom  imposed  the 
necessity  of  labor  for  a  living.  Under  what  was  called 
"  Eadical  Eule,"  good  systems  of  common  schools  were  insti- 
tuted in  several  of  the  Southern  States. 

General  John  Eaton,  afterward  connected  with  the  Depart- 
ment of  the  Interior  at  Washington,  became  the  State  super- 
intendent of  education  for  Tennessee.  Under  his  influence, 
the  Legislature  enacted  a  good  public-school  system  for  the 
whole  people.  The  city  of  Nashville  also  reorganized  its 
schools,  making  provision  for  the  colored  as  well  as  for  the 
white  children.  The  Church,  relieved  of  this  work  of  pri- 
mary instruction,  devoted  the  means  thus  saved  to  the  prepa- 
ration of  teachers  for  the  schools.  To  develop  the  principle 
of  self-help,  a  fee  of  one  dollar  per  month  was  charged  by 
our  school  for  tuition.  Paying  for  education  was  a  new 
thing  to  the  Freedmen.  It  was  not  surprising  that,  under 
tliis  pay  system,  the  enrollment  for  the  year  1867-68  was 
but  about  two  hundred.  The  city  free  schools  were  filled  to 
overflowing.  At  the  opening  of  the  school  year,  September, 
1867,  Rev.  J.  Braden,  A.M.,  was  placed  in  charge  of  the  insti- 
tution, with  Mrs.  Mary  Murphy,  Miss  Emily  E.  Preston,  and 
Mrs.  Sarah  J.  Larned  as  assistants.     Tlie  school  in  name  was 


Central  Tennessee  College.  399 

a  normal  and  theological  school,  without  students  qualified 
for  either.  The  majority  of  the  pupils  were  in  primary 
studies.  The  few  more  advanced  were  too  young  to  preach 
or  teach.  A  change  of  location  became  necessary.  The 
"  Gun  Factory,"  though  built  for  Confederate  war  purposes, 
the  United  States  authorities  ordered  delivered  to  its  private 
owners.  The  trustees  began  to  look  for  a  permanent  site 
for  the  college.  There  was  then  great  opposition  to  the 
education  of  the  colored  people.  A  site  in  Nashville  was, 
after  much  delay,  secured;  that  is,  it  was  purchased,  and 
the  sum  of  $8,258  50  paid  for  it ;  but  when  it  became  known 
that  a  school  for  Freed  men  was  to  be  established  on  it,  an 
appeal  was  made  to  the  Chancery  Court.  The  court  set 
aside  the  sale,  and  ordered  the  purchase  money  returned  to 
tlie  trustees  of  the  college. 

After  some  delay,  another  lot,  of  about  two  acres,  was  pur- 
chased, in  the  south-eastern  part  of  the  city  limits,  with  a 
large  brick  house  upon  it.  This  was  fitted  up  for  a  school, 
and  in  November,  1868,  the  school,  under  control  of  Rev.  G. 
W.  llartupee,  Mr.  Braden  having  resigned  the  position,  re- 
opened in  this  building.  Classes  were  formed  in  the  com- 
mon English  branches,  also  in  algebra  and  Latin,  and  there 
were  a  few  students  in  the  Bible  and  Church  Discipline. 
More  room  being  demanded,  the  Freedmen's  Bureau  erected 
on  this  lot  a  three-storj  brick  building,  which  during  the 
winter  was  ready  for  use.  The  Bureau  also  repaired  the 
building  purchased  with  the  lot,  and  erected  a  two-story 
building  for  a  chapel,  and  for  dormitories.  These  improve- 
ments, costing  over  $20,000,  were  all  conveyed  to  the  college 
trustees  by  the  United  States  government.  The  number  of 
students  the  first  year  in  these  premises  was  over  one 
hundred. 


400  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

The  next  school  year,  1869-YO,  the  departments  becaine 
more  defined.  Tlie  teachers  were  Rev.  J.  Braden,  president, 
and  in  charge  of  the  theological  and  preparatory  depart- 
ments ;  Misses  Maggie  J.  Herbert,  Mary  C.  Owen,  Jennie  S. 
Herbert,  Mrs.  L.  C.  Braden,  Miss  J.  S.  Avery,  and  Mrs. 
George  Bryant,  assistants  in  the  other  departments. 

During  the  year  one  hundred  and  ninety-two  students 
were  enrolled.  The  school  years  1870-74  exhibited  a  steady 
growth,  though  the  frequent  changes  of  teachers  and  incon- 
stancy of  the  students  were  felt  to  be  great  drawbacks  to 
progress.  The  stay  of  students  in  the  school  was  influ- 
enced by  their  lack  of  means,  and  also  by  the  fact,  that,  in- 
competent as  they  were,  they  could  secure  employment  in 
teaching,  with  fair  wages.  That  being  the  case,  they  did  not 
see  why  they  should  longer  confine  themselves  to  school. 
There  was  a  great  demand  for  preachers.  Many  of  the  pious 
young  men  left  school  far  too  soon,  to  respond  to  calls  for 
the  pulpits  of  the  Church.  Hence,  year  after  year,  the  more 
advanced  students  in  the  common  English  branches,  or  in 
the  preparatory  department,  left  the  school  for  these  open 
and  inviting  fields.  Only  two  of  the  twenty-eight  in  tlie 
preparatory  department  between  1870  and  1873  ever  reached 
the  freshman  class.  Higher  qualifications  for  tlie  pulpits 
and  schools  were  needed,  but  they  had  to  struggle  on  with 
such  as  they  could  get. 

When  the  Freedmen's  Bureau  finished  the  two  brick 
buildings,  in  1869,  it  was  thought  that  there  would  be  abun- 
dance of  school-room  for  a  long  time.  But  the  buildings 
soon  filled  up,  so  that  rooms  which  were  intended  originally 
for  two  students,  were  occupied  by  from  three  to  five.  This 
was  the  best  that  could  be  done.  A  new  building  must  be 
had  or  the  school  must  suffer.     Under  the  advice  of  Dr.  R. 


Central  Tennessee  College.  401 

S.  Rust,  a  band  of  singers,  known  all  over  the  country  as 
"  The  Tennesseeans,''  went  out  under  the  direction  of  Mr.  J. 
W.  Donavin,  and  by  their  fine  rendering  of  the  religious 
plantation  melodies  of  the  old  slavery  times,  raised  in  three 
years  about  $18,000.  This,  with  aid  from  the  Freedmen's 
Aid  Society,  through  Dr.  Rust,  erected  a  four-story  brick 
building,  fifty-two  by  ninety  feet,  costing  about  $20,000, 
which  for  the  time  being  amply  met  the  needs  of  the  school. 

In  the  year  1874  the  first  college  class  was  formed.  It 
consisted  of  Miss  Araminta  P.  Martin  and  George  E.  Terrass. 
The  former  was  graduated  in  due  time ;  the  latter  left  school 
before  the  close  of  the  year,  and  never  returned.  As  the 
students  advanced  in  knowledge,  it  was  natural  for  them  to 
become  impressed  with  the  needs  of  their  own  people.  The 
large  death-rate  of  the  I^egroes  attracted  attention.  The 
inquiry  into  the  causes  led  to  the  discovery  that  multitudes 
of  them  were  living  in  places  utterly  unfit  for  human  habita- 
tion. They  were  crowded  together  in  open  buildings,  or  in 
damp  cellars,  or  in  buildings  with  no  ventilation.  In  such 
homes,  with  coarse  food  poorly  prepared,  and  with  igno- 
rant nurses,  it  is  less  wonder  that  they  died,  than  that  any 
of  the  sick  recovered.  It  was  found,  also,  that  it  was  not 
always  possible  to  get  medical  attendance.  Some  physicians 
would  never  go  till  the  money  was  paid  for  the  visit.  This 
was  often  very  difiicult  for  the  poor  people  to  do,  and 
many  died  because  they  did  not  have  medical  attendance. 
Young  men  asked,  "  Can  we  become  doctors  ? "  There 
were  two  large  medical  schools  in  Nashville,  but  no  colored 
student  could  be  admitted.  There  were  no  medical  schools 
in  the  South,  and  but  few  in  the  North,  that  the  Negroes 
could  attend.  ^ 

A  Christian  family  living  in  the  North,  who  had  long 


402  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

sympatliized  with  the  slave  in  bondage,  and  rejoiced  in  his 
freedom,  learned  of  this  necessity,  and  Rev.  Samuel  Me- 
harrj,  of  Shawnee  Mound,  Indiana,  paid  the  expenses  neces- 
sary for  beginning  the  Meharry  Medical  Department.  This 
contribution  was  followed  by  others  from  the  same  donor, 
and  from  his  brothers,  Mr.  Hugh  Meharry,  Rev.  Alexander 
Meharry,  of  the  Cincinnati  Conference,  and  David  Meharry, 
with  which  ground  was  purchased  and  an  elegant  four-story 
brick  building  erected  for  a  medical  college.  This  family 
has  continued  to  aid  in  the  support  of  the  school,  and,  since 
the  death  of  Rev.  A.  Meharry,  his  widow  has  nobly  con- 
tributed to  a  work  in  which  her  sainted  husband  took  so 
lively  an  interest.  Rev.  G.  W.  Hubbard,  M.D.,  was  ap- 
pointed dean  of  this  department.  There  were  few  physicians, 
at  first,  who  were  willing  to  be  known  as  lecturers  in  a  med- 
ical school  for  ISTegroes.  There  were,  however,  noble  spirits 
that  dared  to  enter  this  work,  and  did  so  for  low  compensa- 
tion, in  order  that  they  might  help  an  oppressed  and  ignorant 
people.  W.  J.  Sneed,  M.D.,  and  K  G.  Tucker,  M.D.,  of 
Nashville,  entered  this  work. 

These  were  Southern  men  ;  had  been  in  the  Confederate 
army  during  the  war ;  yet,  recognizing  the  necessity,  tliey 
entered  this  work  at  the  risk  of  losing  their  practice  among 
the  w^hites.  The  first  graduate  from  this  medical  school  was 
James  Monroe  Jamison,  in  February,  1877.  For  many  years 
the  medical  schools  of  the  city  had  been  sending  out  scores 
and  hundreds  annually,  but  never  a  son  of  Ham.  Now  a 
real  Negro  was  to  graduate  at  a  medical  college  in  this  city, 
wliere  Negroes  had  been  bought  and  sold  by  hundreds.  One 
of  these  ex-slaves  has  passed  through  his  course  of  study, 
and  is  to  receive  his  degree.  The  chapel  was  crowded,  and 
after  he  had  delivered  his  thesis  and  had  received  the  class 


Central  Tennessee  College.  403 

address  from  Dr.  Tucker,  and  his  degree  from  President 
Braden,  the  applause  which  greeted  the  new-made  doctor 
was  very  hearty  and  prolonged.  The  event  was  rendered 
further  notable  by  the  presence  and  address  of  Bishop  Gil- 
bert Haven,  than  whom  the  Freed  men  had  no  truer  friend. 

Dr.  Jamison  practiced  successfully  in  Xashville  for  several 
years,  and  then  went  to  Topeka,  Kansas,  where  he  is  still 
practicing.  The  Medical  Department  had  scarcely  been  insti- 
tuted before  there  was  an  inquiry  about  law.  The  Negro 
against  the  wliite  had  no  chance  in  the  courts,  for,  somehow, 
the  former  always  had  a  bad  case,  and  the  latter  always  a 
good  one. 

In  1879  the  Law  Department  was  organized,  with  E.  L. 
Gregory,  Esq.,  dean.  Hon.  John  Lawrence  was  associated 
with  him  in  the  faculty  for  this  year.  J.  L.  Whitworth, 
B.S.,  B.L.,  and  Hon.  James  Trimble,  were  afterward  added 
to  the  faculty.  The  attendance  has  been  small,  never  reach- 
ing more  than  eight  or  ten,  and  only  one  has  graduated, 
Joseph  n.  Dismukes,  1883,  who  has  practiced  successfully 
in  Kansas  and  Tennessee.  The  department  is  thoroughly  or- 
ganized, and  is  no  expense  to  the  Church. 

It  was  the  desire  of  the  teachers  in  the  college  to  impart  a 
more  practical  education  to  the  students.  Many  of  the  young 
women  know  comparatively  nothing  of  domestic  duties. 

In  the  autunm  of  1883  Rev.  Atticus  G.  Haygood,  D.D., 
agent  of  the  Slater  Fund,  made  an  appropriation  for  an  In- 
dustrial Department.  Miss  S.  A.  Bai-nes,  preceptress,  assisted 
by  Miss  L.  H.  Hitchcock  and  Miss  M.  E.  Young,  took  charge. 
The  young  women  were  taught  sewing,  mending,  darning, 
and  making  garments.  At  the  National  Teachers'  Exhibi- 
tion, at  Madison,  Wisconsin,  specimens  of  their  work  attract- 
ed attention  for  its  excellence.      Other  aid  from  the  Slater 


404  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Fund,  in  1884,  enabled  the  department  to  secure  sewing- 
machines  and  teach  their  use.  This,  with  a  teacher  in  cut- 
ting and  fitting,  enabled  the  young  women  to  place  speci- 
mens of  mending,  darning,  crocheting,  lace  work,  also  gar- 
ments cut  and  made  by  themselves,  with  specimens  of  fancy 
work,  in  the  World's  Exposition  at  New  Orleans.  Other 
needful  industries  will  be  taught  as  soon  as  the  means  can  be 
secured. 

Two  years  ago  Messrs.  Allison  and  Smith,  of  Cincinnati, 
Ohio,  donated  through  Rev.  Dr.  (now  Bishop)  Walden,  a 
neat  job  press.  The  young  men  were  organized  into  an  In- 
dustrial Department,  under  Dr.  G.  W.  Hubbard,  and  soon 
were  able  to  print  the  "  College  Record,"  a  small  monthly 
paper,  and  do  such  job  work  as  cards,  programmes,  etc.  Dr. 
Hay  good  and  the  Slater  Fund  came  again  to  our  help.  Ad- 
ditional type  and  a  larger  press  were  secured,  and  also  in- 
struction from  a  practical  printer.  The  young  men  have, 
the  past  year,  printed  two  monthly  papers  of  four  and  eight 
pages,  and  a  large  amount  of  miscellaneous  matter.  Some 
of  them  have  been  offered  positions  in  printing  offices  as 
regular  printers.  In  the  line  of  carpentry  something  has 
been  done.  Out  of  the  slender  resources  of  the  college  a 
shop  was  fitted  up,  and  four  benches  put  in.  These  were 
insufficient,  but  they  developed  the  fact  that  some  of  the 
young  men  were  as  anxious  to  know  how  to  do  carpenter 
work  as  others  were  to  study  medicine  or  law. 

Another  building  was  erected,  and  more  benches  set  up. 
By  the  aid  of  the  Slater  Fund  a  suitable  instructor  has  been 
engaged  for  the  past  two  years  with  most  encouraging  re- 
sults. It  is  due  to  all  parties  concerned  to  say,  that  this  In- 
dustrial Department  is  due  very  largely  to  the  aid  furnished 
by  the  Slater  Fund,  through  the  general  agent.  Rev.  Dr. 


Central  Tennessee  College.  405 

A.  G.  Hay  good.  The  commencement  of  the  Medical  Depart- 
ment of  1885  witnessed  the  graduation  of  eight  young  men. 
The  theses  of  the  graduates  were  of  a  high  order,  and  de- 
livered in  excellent  style.  The  appearance  of  the  whole  class 
was  that  of  gentlemen.  They  had  all  received  a  thorough 
English  education ;  most  of  them  had  studied  the  prepara- 
tory college  course,  and  one  had  graduated  and  received  his 
A.B.  There  have  been  enrolled  over  three  thousand  dif- 
ferent pupils  since  the  opening  of  the  school.  To  one  who 
has  watched  the  progress  of  the  school,  day  by  day,  the 
progress  may  seem  slow ;  but,  when  it  is  remembered  that 
these  students  going  out  into  successful  professional  life 
were,  a  few  years  ago,  the  property  of  others,  and  com- 
pelled to  be  ignorant  by  law,  the  progress  is  simply  wonder- 
ful. They  went  to  work  expecting  to  conquer.  They  have 
passed  from  the  primary  school  up  through  the  several  grades 
to  the  college.  They  have  passed  on  into  the  professional 
schools,  and  filled  their  places  in  all  these  grades  and  pro- 
fessions with  credit.  From  the  auction-block  to  the  rostrum, 
from  the  shambles  to  the  professor's  chair,  all  within  these 
few  years.  They  have  advanced,  not  only  intellectually,  but 
in  social  and  moral  life. 

The  teachers  and  friends  of  the  colored  people  are  occa- 
sionally shocked  by  the  lapse  of  some  of  the  most  promising 
ones.  The  Negro  has  his  full  share  of  the  fallen  nature  of 
the  human  race.  The  idea  that  this  is  a  Christian  school, 
supported  by  the  contributions  of  Christian  men  and  women, 
is  kept  before  the  students.  They  are  required  to  attend 
church  and  Sunday-school,  and  also  the  Wednesday  night 
prayer  meeting.  They  are  forbidden  to  use  tobacco  or  intox- 
icating liquors.  The  majority  of  our  students  are  adults. 
Some  have  families  for  whom  they  must  provide  ;  some  are 


406  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

preachers  in  charge  of  circuits,  who  can  get  away  from  their 
work  only  for  a  very  short  period  ;  others  are  teachers,  who 
can  come  to  school  during  their  winter's  vacation  ;  and  many 
others  are  farmers,  wlio  run  into  school  during  the  few 
months  that  they  cannot  work  on  the  farm. 

While  this  shows  the  desire  for  learning  on  the  part  of 
the  students,  it  also  reveals  the  obstacles  in  the  way  of  thor- 
ough and  regular  classification,  and  the  impossibility  of  hav- 
ing large  classes  in  the  college  course,  or  in  any  of  the  pro- 
fessional schools. 

The  Theological  Department. 

The  necessity  for  a  more  intelligent  ministry  was  impera- 
tive. Many  of  the  canditates  for  the  ministry  at  the  close  of 
the  war  were  not  able  to  read.  They  needed  primary  in- 
struction in  the  common  English  studies,  yet  they  were  ad- 
mitted into  the  Conferences  as  the  best  that  could  be  done. 
Some  of  these  came  to  school.  Their  biblical  instruction 
was  of  the  most  elementary  character.  The  progress  in  real 
theological  study  was  very  slow,  as  the  greater  part  of  the 
w^ork  for  these  students  was  to  learn  to  read,  write,  and  get 
some  knowledge  of  arithmetic.  As  students  advanced,  the 
course  of  study  was  gradually  increased,  till  the  whole  course 
of  systematic,  historical,  pastoral,  and  dogmatic  theology, 
with  Greek  and  Hebrew,  was  embraced.  In  1882  the  first 
graduate,  Julius  J.  Holland,  in  this  department  received  his 
diploma,  with  the  degree  B.D.,  he  having  received  the  de- 
gree of  A.B.  in  1881.  R.  Harper  and  E.  Tyree  were  grad- 
uated the  next  year  in  the  shorter  course,  and  received  cer- 
tificates of  graduation. 

In  1883  Rev.  D.  M.  Birmingham  was  appointed  dean,  and 
succeeded  admirably  in  organizing  the  department,  when,  to 


Central  Tennessee  College.  407 

tlie  regret  of  all,  he  was  compelled,  at  the  end  of  the  fourth 
month,  to  leave  the  work.  Professor  Patterson,  who  has 
long  been  connected  with  the  college,  supplied  his  place  the 
balance  of  the  year.  L.  M.  Ilagood  and  A.  W.  McKinnej 
received  certificates  of  graduation  at  the  end  of  this  year. 
In  1884  Rev.  R.  "W.  Keeler,  of  the  Upper  Iowa  Conference, 
was  appointed  dean,  and  entered  upon  the  work  with  enthu- 
siastic zeal.  He  succeeded  in  getting  the  department  into 
good  working  order. 

The  most  important  factor  in  the  real  elevation  of  the 
Negro,  and  in  the  solution  of  many  of  the  problems  con- 
nected with  his  dwelling  in  this  country,  is  the  pulpit.  No 
labor  or  expense  should  be  spared  to  make  it  a  power  for  the 
highest  good.  Over  two  hundred  students  have  been 
enrolled  in  the  department  of  theology,  and  the  average 
attendance  for  sixteen  years  is  twenty-eight.  These  students 
are  scattered  through  eight  or  more  Conferences  of  our  own 
Church,  and  in  nearly  as  many  more  of  the  other  branches 
of  Methodism,  as  well  as  a  few  in  the  Baptist,  Presbyterian, 
and  other  Churches.  They  occupy  positions  in  the  pastorate 
in  cities  like  St.  Louis,  Louisville,  Nashville,  and  Cincin- 
nati. They  are  principals  of  institutions  of  learning,  presid- 
ing eldei*s,  secretaries  of  church  societies,  and  successful 
preachers  of  the  Gospel  in  most  of  the  Southern  States,  and 
in  some  States  north  of  the  Ohio. 

If  this  school  had  done  nothing  more  than  give  this  band 
of  earnest  ministers  to  the  Church,  that  alone  would  have 
remunerated  all  the  outlay  for  buildings  and  support  which 
the  Church  has  made. 


408  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


CHAPTER  11. 

CLARK      UNIVERSITY. 

BY   PRESIDENT  REV,  E.  0.  THAYER,  A.M. 

Bishop  Davis  W.  Clakk,  D.D.,  was  one  of  the  founders, 
and  the  first  president,  of  the  Freed  men's  Aid  Society  of 
the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  In  his  episcopal  tours  he 
traversed  the  war-devastated  South,  and  in  his  pathway- 
sprang  up  churches  and  schools  for  all  classes  of  people. 
Clark  ^University  is  only  one  of  the  institutions  established 
by  his  wisdom  and  fostered  by  his  zeal.  He  recognized 
Atlanta  as  the  best  location  in  the  South  for  a  large  univer- 
sity. He  early  formed  a  purpose  to  make  Clark  Univer- 
sity a  training-school  for  ministers  and  teachers ;  and  at  his 
death  he  left  a  generous  legacy  for  the  accomplishment  of 
one  of  the  cherished  purposes  of  his  life. 

Others  took  up  the  work  as  he  left  it,  and  have  brought  it 
to  a  condition  of  success  that  surpasses  even  Bishop  Clark's 
fondest  hopes.  Bishop  Gilbert  Haven,  with  his  statesman- 
like foresight,  saw  the  possibilities  of  such  a  school  in  'the 
central  South,  and  he  laid  the  foundations  broad  and  deep, 
and  planned  a  superstructure  that  many  of  his  coadjutors 
called  visionary.  But  the  rapidly  rolling  years  are  proving 
that  he  had  the  eye  of  a  prophet,  as  well  as  of  a  statesman, 
and  with  it  saw  a  greater  future  for  Atlanta  and  the  South, 
and  the  Freedmen,  than  most  of  his  contemporaries.  By 
his  own  personal  effort,  at  the  risk  of  his  own  private 
resources,  and  in  spite  of  opposition,  he  purchased  four  hun- 
dred and  fifty  acres  of  land,  within  two  miles  of  the  heart  of 


Clakk  University.  409 

tlie  city,  which  is  rapidly  spreading  to  and  around  the  prop- 
erty. In  a  few  years  this  will  furnish  an  endowment  that 
will  make  Clark  University  a  permanent  educational  center 
from  which  shall  radiate  the  light  of  wisdom  and  salvation 
to  generations  yet  unborn. 

Bishop  Haven  lived  long  enough  to  stand  on  the  founda- 
tion walls  of  Chrisman  Hall,  and  look  out  upon  the  beauti- 
ful city  of  Atlanta,  and  rejoice  that  its  citizens  could  see 
from  their  windows  the  stately  structure  reminding  them 
that  the  colored  man  had  friends  who  were  trying  to  make 
him  worthy  of  freedom  and  suffrage.  From  there  he  went 
to  his  Northern  home,  and  soon  joined  Bishop  Clark  in  his 
eternal  rest.  He  left  the  work  incomplete,  but  God  raised 
up  others  to  carry  it  on. 

Rev.  R.  S.  Rust,  D.D.,  as  field  superintendent  and  secre- 
tary, had  been  toiling  on,  all  these  years,  and  had  seen  these 
noble  co-workers  fall  at  his  side.  Though  almost  heart- 
broken at  the  loss  of  Bishop  Haven,  whom  he  loved  as  a 
brother,  and  shoulder  to  shoulder  with  whom  he  had  been 
carrying  heavy  burdens,  he  bravely  assumed  all  responsi- 
bilities, and  endeavored  to  carry  out  all  the  Bishop's  great 
plans.  **  Chrisman  Hall  must  be  finished  "  were  his  words. 
Mrs.  Eliza  Chrisman,  in  whose  honor  the  building  was 
named,  had  donated  §10,000.  Dr.  Rust  assumed  the  remain- 
ing $20,000,  and  the  work  was  done.  Bishop  Warren  was 
next  assigned  to  the  Southern  field,  and  entered,  with  his 
large  heart  and  earnest  soul,  upon  the  work  of  finishing  the 
superstmcture  so  well  begun  by  his  predecessors.  Gammon 
Hall  and  the  industrial  department  stand  as  monuments  of 

his  zeal  and  wisdom. 
18 


410  Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 


STEPS   OF   PROGRESS. 

But  we  must  leave  this  general  survey  of  the  work  and  its 
leading  spirits,  and,  retracing  oar  steps,  look  at  the  history 
more  in  detail. 

The  university  began  as  a  primary  and  normal  school  in 
1869.  The  third  annual  report  of  the  Freedmen's  Aid  Soci- 
ety says  that  Atlanta  was  chosen  as  the  location  for  a  normal 
school,  "  that  it  might  give  tone  and  influence  to  our  move- 
ments all  over  the  State ;  for  Atlanta  is  the  gate- way  to  the 
South,  and  exerts  a  controlling  influence  over  it."  At  this 
time  the  society  supported  primary  schools  in  nearly  all  the 
large  towns  of  the  State,  thus  making  Clark  University  the 
center  of  the  system.  It  is  a  matter  of  regret  that  lack  of 
funds  has  compelled  the  society  to  abandon  all  but  two  of 
these  feeders  of  the  university.  The  first  sessions  were  held 
in  Clark  Chapel,  under  the  supervision  of  Kev.  J.  W.  Lee, 
whose  name  is  still  held  in  affectionate  remembrance  by 
scores  of  men  and  women  who  received  their  first  inspira- 
tion for  lives  of  Christian  usefulness  from  his  instructions. 
Press  of  ministerial  duties  to  which  his  life  was  devoted 
compelled  Mr.  Lee  to  surrender  the  work  to  Rev.  D. 
W.  Hammond,  who  selected  as  his  assistants  Miss  Leila 
Fuller  and  Miss  Mary  Dickinson.  During  this  year  a 
large  brick  school-house  was  purchased  for  $5,000.  For 
tome  reason  the  school  again  changed  leaders,  Miss  Lou  Hen- 
ley becoming  principal.  Late  in  the  year  1870,  Mr.  Uriah 
Cleary  assumed  the  master's  ferrule,  and  ruled  over  one 
hundred  and  thirty  students,  with  the  assistance  of  Mrs.  Lida 
E.  Lee  and  Miss  Sarah  Echelberger.  In  February,  1872, 
tlie  school,  with  its  teachers,  Mrs.  Mary  and  Miss  Oldfield, 
under   the    principalship  of    Rev.  I.  Marcy,  A.M.,   passed 


Clark  University.  411 

under  the  control  of  the  city  of  Atlanta,  according  to  an 
agreement  by  which  the  latter  received  the  use  of  the  school- 
house,  and  in  return  paid  the  salaries  of  the  teachers,  who 
were  still  to  be  selected  by  the  society.  This  was  considered 
an  advantageous  arrangement,  as  it  left  the  society  free  to 
use  its  funds  in  establishing  a  theological  school,  in  compli- 
ance with  the  wishes  of  Bishop  Clark,  who  had  left,  by  will, 
an  endowment  fund  of  several  thousand  dollars.  Accord- 
ingly the  Clark  Theological  Seminary  was  opened  in  Febru- 
ary, 1872,  with  Eev.  L.  D.  Barrows,  D.D.,  as  dean,  in  a  new 
building  purchased  for  the  purpose.  In  describing  this 
opening  the  annual  report  thus  enthusiastically  speaks  :  "  The 
grounds  are  ample  for  any  additional  buildings  that  may 
be  hereafter  required.  The  entire  property  is  well  adapted 
to  the  design  in  view,  and  its  purchase  marks  a  new  era  in 
our  rapidly  advancing  Southern  work.  The  fulfillment  of 
fond  hopes  is  about  to  be  realized  in  the  better  preparation 
of  the  scores  who  are  yearly  entering  our  ministerial  ranks." 
Little  did  these  earnest  men  realize  how  soon  these  grounds 
would  become  too  small  to  accommodate  the  rapidly  expand- 
ing university,  and  the  *'  school  of  the  prophets  "  be  lodged 
in  a  mansion  nearly  large  enough  to  cover  the  whole  site. 
God  had  provided  greater  things  than  man's  feeble  faith 
could  anticipate. 

Rev.  E.  Q.  Fuller,  D.D.,  of  sainted  memory,  llevs.  J.  H. 
Knowles,  A.M.,  and  Rev.  J.  W.  Lee,  A.M.,  assisted  Dr.  Bar- 
rows in  his  important  work.  Dr.  Fuller  was  always  a  warm 
friend  of  the  school,  advocating  it  in  the  North,  securing 
students,  advising  in  all  its  steps  of  progress,  and  giving 
generously  from  his  own  scanty  means.  lie  deserves  some 
memorial  on  its  campus  as  a  token  of  gratitude  from  those 
to  whose  service  he  gave  his  labors  and  his  life. 


412  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Twentj-six  students  were  enrolled  during  the  first  month, 
several  of  whom  are  now  occupying  prominent  positions  in 
various  Southern  Conferences.  Dr.  Barrows,  who  was  but 
temporarily  in  the  South  for  his  health,  returned  to  his 
Northern  home  during  the  year,  hoping  to  continue  in  his 
chosen  life-work  ;  but  soon  he  was  called  to  his  heavenly 
reward  and  rest.  Rev.  J.  W.  Lee  was  again  called  to  stand 
in  the  breach,  which  he  did  manfully,  in  connection  with 
other  duties,  till  the  fall  of  1874,  with  Professor  Gosling 
and  Mrs.  Lee,  when  Rev.  I.  J.  Lansing,  A.M.,  was  elected 
president. 

In  the  meantime  the  city  had  purchased  the  old  school- 
building,  and  the  society  no  longer  furnished  teachers  for 
the  public  schools.  Accordingly,  under  Mr.  Lansing's  presi- 
dency, the  various  courses  of  study  were  reorganized,  and 
the  theological  school  again  became  one  of  the  departments 
of  a  university.  The  reputation  of  the  school  began  to 
spread,  students  came  crowding  in,  and  a  new  frame  build- 
ing was  erected  to  accommodate  the  increase.  Mr.  Lansing 
resigned  at  the  close  of  his  second  year,  much  to  the  regret 
of  all,  but  he  felt  that  his  call  was  to  the  pulpit  and  nut  to 
the  school -room.  He  has  frequently  since  employed  his 
oratorical  powers  in  awakening  sympathy  and  securing  aid 
for  the  Freedmen. 

Mr.  Lansing's  assistants  were  Professor  Watson,  Mrs. 
Lansing,  and  Misses  Alice  Buck  and  Martha  Smith. 

The  one  year  of  the  presidency  of  J.  Y.  Martin,  A.M.,  was 
distinguished  by  the  securing  of  a  charter  granting  full 
university  powers.  The  names  of  the  first  board  of  trustees 
under  this  charter  were  Gilbert  Haven,  Richard  S.  Rust, 
Mary  J.  Clark,  Eliphalet  Remington,  Joseph  H.  Chadwick, 
Washington  C.  De  Pauvv,  Henry  K.  List,  Eliza  Chrisman, 


Clark  University.  413 

Robert  T.  Kent,  Charles  O.  Fisher,  John  C.  Kimball,  Josiah 
Sherman,  Theodore  G.  Eiswald,  William  H.  Crogman, 
James  Mitchell,  Henry  R.  Parmenter,  George  Standing, 
James  Y.  Martin,  Seaborn  C.  Upshaw,  and  Erasmus  Q.  Ful- 
ler. During  tliis  administration  W.  H.  Crogman,  A.M.,  be- 
came a  teacher  in  the  college.  At  the  present  time  (1885) 
he  holds  the  position  of  professor  of  ancient  languages  and 
litei-ature.  He  has  achieved  fame  for  himself,  his  race,  and 
the  university  by  his  eloquent  addresses  in  Plymouth  Church, 
Brooklyn,  and  at  the  national  educational  assemblies  at  Ocean 
Grove  and  Madison.  Miss  Mary  C.  Owen  also  did  excellent 
service  under  Professor  Martin  and  his  successor. 

In  the  fall  of  1877  Rev.  R.  E.  Bisbee,  A.M.,  was  chosen 
president.  He  had  as  assistants  Professor  and  Mrs.  Crog- 
man, Mrs.  Bisbee,  F.  A.  Rogers,  M.D.,  Miss  Florence  Mitch- 
ell, Miss  Mary  C.  Owen,  and  Miss  Sibyl  E.  Abbott.  The 
frequent  changes  of  adminstration  and  faculty,  the  crowded 
quarters,  the  vicinity  of  well-equipped  and  well-endowed  in- 
stitutions, and  other  causes,  had  a  depressing  effect  upon 
the  growth  of  the  young  university.  Mr.  Bisbee,  in  spite  of 
these  difficulties,  infused  new  life  into  every  department, 
raised  the  standard  of  scholarship,  and  was  the  first  to  send 
out  some  graduates  from  the  normal  and  college  preparatory 
departments.  The  fii*st  catalogue  was  published  in  1879.  It 
showed  an  attendance  of  one  hundred  and  seventy-nine, 
twenty-nine  of  whom  were  in  the  academic  classes,  and  four- 
teen in  the  theological  department. 

The  corner-stone  of  Chrisman  Hall  was  laid  by  Bishop 
Simpson  and  Dr.  Rust  February  3,  1880.  The  address  of 
the  Bishop  was  worthy  of  the  man  and  the  occiision.  Among 
other  hopeful  prophecies  he  said:  *' And  this  college  to  day 
looks  on  the  foundation  of  a  building  more  beautiful,  more 


414  Eaely  Schools  of  Methodism. 

commodious,  larger  and  grander  than  the  first  buildings  of 
any  of  the  institutions  connected  with  our  Church  with 
which  I  was  acquainted  in  my  youth,  and  though  the  begin- 
ning be  small,  what  is  the  promise  ?  Look  at  these  broad 
acres,  look  at  that  large  area ;  see  the  institution  as  it  stands 
on  this  eminence  and  looks  upon  the  beautiful  city  of  At- 
lanta. All  those  acres,  except  the  college  campus,  will  one 
day  be  occupied  by  citizens  who  shall  rejoice  in  its  progress. 
...  I  have  no  doubt  that  there  are  young  people  in  this 
assembly  who  will  live  to  see  the  period  when  there  shall  be 
other  edifices,  large  and  beautiful  and  commodious,  in  the 
campus  with  this  structure,  and  will  live  to  see  its  alumni 
scattered  all  over  the  land."  The  good  Bishop  himself  lived 
to  see  that  bright  day  when  a  large  part  of  his  prophecy  was 
fulfilled. 

On  the  16th  of  October,  in  the  same  year,  Clirisman  Hall 
was  dedicated.  It  was  a  memorable  day  in  the  history  of 
the  school.  Dr.  Eust  made  an  eloquent  introductory  speech, 
and  Bishop  Warren  gave  the  principal  address.  Bishops 
Wiley,  E.  O.  Haven,  and  Turner  assisted  in  the  services.  A 
very  large  number  of  prominent  Southern  clergymen  and 
citizens  were  present.  Governor  Colquitt,  Senator  Brown, 
Dr.  Hoyt,  editor  of  the  "  Western  Advocate,"  and  Bishops 
Wiley  and  Haven  made  interesting  speeches.  This  inter- 
change of  sentiments  among  such  prominent  men  of  both 
sections,  awakened  new  interest  in  Clark  University  and  the 
cause  of  education.  Bishop  Warren,  in  his  address,  thus 
appropriately  alludes  to  the  lady  in  whose  honor  the  hall 
was  named :  "  Tliis  building  is  monumental  and  significant 
in  another  particular,  namely,  that  a  woman,  Mrs.  Chrisman, 
takes  her  grand  part  in  the  development  and  glory  of  the 
future  by  contributing  from  lier  private  nieans  one  third  of 


Clark  ITnivfrsity.  415 

the  cost.  It  is  fitting  that  the  Bishop,  who  held  womanhood 
so  sacred,  who  was  ever  ready  to  write,  speak,  and  act  tliat 
all  her  rip;hts  should  be  secured,  and  who  looked  upon  her 
love  as  so  divine  that  it  could  never  know  a  change — fitting 
that  he  should  have  a  woman  come  to  his  aid  in  the  grandest 
work  of  his  life." 

In  reply  to  a  request  for  a  poem.  Dr.  Hust  received  the 
following  letter  from  John  G.  Whittier,  and  it  was  read  at 
the  dediciition : 

Daxvers,  Mass.,  dth  month,  26,  1880. 

My  Dear  Friend:  I  wish  I  could  do  what  thee  asks  for;  but  I  urn 
compelled,  by  the  state  of  my  health,  to  forbear  making  any  literary 
engagements.  I  have  long  suffered  from  overtask,  and  must  not  prom- 
ise what  it  might  be  physically  impossible  for  me  to  perform.  For  the 
cause's  sake,  for  the  good  Bishop's  sake,  and  for  thy  own  (for  I  know 
thee  as  a  devoted  friend  of  the  poor  and  oppressed),  I  would  gladly 
answer  otherwise. 

The  moral  and  intellectual  education  of  the  Freedracn  is  the  special 
and  imperative  necessity  of  our  day.  If  Christian  love  and  charity  did 
not  prompt  it,  duty  to  ourselves  and  our  country  would  demand  it. 
The  very  life  of  the  nation  depends  upon  it. 

With  all  my  heart  I  bid  the  Freedmen's  Aid  Society  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church  "Godspeed  "  in  its  holy  work. 

Thy  friend,  John  G.  WnrmER. 

After  a  successful  service  of  three  years,  Mr.  Bisbee  re- 
signed, and  Rev.  E,  O.  Tiiayer,  A.M.,  for  six  years  principal 
of  Bennett  Seminary,  Greensbo rough,  N.  C,  was  elected 
presideiit.  During  the  first  four  years  of  this  administration 
the  following  persons  have  served  as  instructors :  Rev.  W. 
P.  Thirkicld,  A.M.,  B.D.,  dean  of  school  of  theology;  Will- 
iam II.  Crogman,  A.M.,  professor  of  ancient  languages  ; 
Edith  L.  Smith,  A.M.,  professor  of  English  literature;  Rev. 
C.  J.  Brown,  A.M.,  professor  of  sciences  ;  Misses  Florence  L. 


416  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

Mitchell,  S.  E.  Abbott,  A.M.,  and  Zella  F.  Adams,  B.L., 
preceptresses  ;  John  W.  Cardwell  and  "W.  A.  Heath,  instruct- 
ors in  English  department;  Misses  A.  G.  Gibbs,  C.  M.  Blunt, 
and  Minnie  I.  BajHss,  instructors  in  music ;  Z.  T.  Spencer, 
S.  A.  Camp,  W.  F.  Wheeler,  W.  H.  Thayer,  W.  P.  Sloan, 
and  B.  F.  Hoyt,  instructors  in  industrial  department. 

The  department  of  industrial  education  has  been  develo]>e(i 
so  far  as  to  win  from  Rev.  A.  G.  Haygood,  D.D.,  tlie  enco- 
mium that  "  Clark  University  is  second  only  to  Hampton  in 
this  line."  The  carpenter  shop  contains  an  engine,  saws, 
lathes  and  planers,  and  full  sets  of  tools.  The  young  men 
plan  buildings,  and  have  erected  a  large  number  of  cottages. 
The  carriage  shop  is  constantly  employed  filling  orders  for 
carriages  and  wagons,  thus  furnishing  instruction  and  em- 
ployment to  a  large  number  of  students.  Tlie  harness  and 
shoe  shops  are  also  in  operation.  The  printing-office  issues  a 
biweekly  paper,  and  prints  catalogues,  and  does  all  the  work 
of  a  large  printing  establishment.  The  "  Model  Home," 
the  conception  and  inauguration  of  which  Clark  University 
claims,  gives  instruction  in  the  art  of  housekeeping  in  all 
its  branches  and  details.  The  sewing-school  teaches  dress- 
making, millinery,  and  all  kinds  of  plain  and  fancy  sewing. 
Other  departments  will  be  added  as  the  interests  of  the  stu- 
dents seem  to  demand. 

December  16,  1883,  ground  was  broken  for  Gammon  Hall 
by  Bishop  Warren,  assisted  by  the  members  of  the  Savannah 
Conference,  then  in  session  in  the  city.  One  third *of  the 
cost  of  the  building,  and  an  endowment  fund  of  $20,000, 
were  donated  by  Rev.  E.  II.  Gammon,  of  Batavia,  111.  Mr. 
Gammon  is  a  superannuated  member  of  the  Maine  Confer- 
ence, who,  being  compelled  to  give  up  the  ministry"  on  ac- 
count of  throat  disease,  has  accumulated  a  fortune,  and  now 


Clark  IJNivEKsrn'.  417 

uses  it  as  a  faitliful  steward  of  the  Lord  in  helping  to  fit 
otliers  for  the  work  that  was  denied  himself.  Thus  the 
voice  taken  away  is  being  multiplied  many  hundred-fold, 
and  a  thousand  trumpets  instead  of  one  shall  give  forth  the 
Gospel  sound.  Bishop  Warren  shouldered  the  heavy  bur- 
den of  raising  the  remaining  two  thirds — over  $16,000.  It 
took  months  of  hard  work  in  lecturing  and  soliciting,  but 
success  was  won.  Scoi-es  of  Methodist  preachers  helped 
liim  from  their  scanty  salaries,  and  thus  gained  an  inter- 
est in  the  great  work  of  training  ministers  for  this  Southern 
field. 

On  May  12,  1883,  the  corner-stone  was  laid,  with  appro- 
priate ceremonies,  by  President  Thayer.  Bisliop  H.  M.  Tur- 
ner, D.D.,  LL.D.,  delivered  a  very  eloquent  address,  followed 
by  Rev.  E.  Q.  Fuller,  D.D.,  in  a  very  timely  speech  on  the 
education  of  women.  December  15  of  the  same  year  the 
building  was  dedicated.  Bishop  Warren  and  Dr.  Rust 
made  the  principal  addresses.  Bishop  Warren  has  since  left 
the  South  for  his  episcopal  residence  in  Colorado,  but  Gam- 
mon Ilall  stands  as  a  monument  to  his  zeal  and  devotion  in 
the  Southern  work. 

The  Ganunon  School  of  Theology  began  work  in  its  new 

hall  in  October  of  1883,  with  Rev.  W.  P.  Thirkield  as  dean, 

and  an  attendance  of  nineteen  from  four  Sonthern  States. 

During   the   second  year   there  were  twenty-nine  students 

from  six  different  States,  showing  the  wisdom  of  those  who 

located  the  school  in  Atlanta  because  of  *'  its  accessibility  to 

the  whole  South."     By  another  act  of  generosity  of   our 

benefactor,  Mr.   Gammon,   another  professorship  has  been 

established,  and  the  third  year  opens  with  flattering  prospects. 

Tinis,  at  last,  has  Bishop  Clark's  idea  of  a  theological  school 

at  Atlanta  been  realized,  even  more  gran<lly  than  his  faith 
18* 


418  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

allowed  him  to  consider  as  possible  so  early  in  the  history  of 
the  university. 

As  a  last  item  of  interest  in  this  general  survey  of  the 
progress  of  Clark  University,  it  may  be  proper  to  mention 
that  Mr.  Gammon  has  pledged  one  half  the  cost  of  "Warren 
Hall,  and  a  portion  of  the  remaining  half  is  also  pledged. 
Doubtless  before  these  pages  are  in  print  the  walls  will  be 
rising,  and  thus  another  mile-stone  of  progress  be  fairly 
reached.  The  new  hall  is  to  be  used  for  girls'  dormitories 
and  for  a  general  refectory. 

PRESENT   PROPERTY. 

The  university  now  owns  four  hundred  and  fifty  acres  of 
land,  valued  at  $80,000,  located  just  outside  the  city  limits, 
and  rapidly  rising  in  value.  Most  of  it  is  wooded,  and  all 
richly  varied  with  hills  and  vales  and  running  streams — a 
natural  park.  Chrisman  Hall  is  an  imposing  structure  of 
brick  on  a  basement  story  of  granite.  It  contains  forty  dor- 
mitories, teachers'  apartments,  chapel,  school-rooms,  and  other 
public  rooms.  It  is  located  on  an  eminence  in  full  view  of 
Atlanta.  Gammon  Hall  is  a  four  story  brick  building 
trimmed  with  stone,  of  chaste  and  beautiful  architecture, 
very  appropriate  to  its  use.  There  are  in  it  thirty-two  large 
dormitories,  a  lecture  room,  four  recitation  rooms,  and  three 
large  apartments  for  library  and  offices.  Thei^e  are  also  two 
shops  and  a  barn,  and  dormitory  for  the  Industrial  Depiirt- 
nient,  the  "  Model  Home,"  two  residences  for  professors,  and 
five  cottages  for  married  theological  students,  all  of  which 
were  built  by  carpentry  students.  The  "  theological  cot- 
tages "  were  projected  by  Dean  Thirkield,  and  erected  with 
money  obtained  by  him  from  Northern  friends. 


Bakee  Institute  and  Claflin  University.       419 


CHAPTER  III. 

BAKFIR  INSTITUTE  AND  CLAFLIN  UNIYERSITY. 

BY  REV.    LEWIS  M.    DUNTON,    A.M. 

When  Rev.  T.  Willard  Lewis  and  Rev.  Alonzo  Webster 
opened  their  evangelical  labors  among  the  colored  people  of 
Charleston,  S.  C,  at  the  close  of  the  war,  they  found  quite  a 
number  of  pious,  talented,  young  colored  men,  with  some 
little  education.  With  suitable  previous  training  and  educa- 
tion, they  saw  that  these  could  be  most  usefully  employed 
as  agents  for  the  elevation  and  evangelization  of  others  of 
their  race,  many  of  whom  were  hungering  for  knowledge 
and  thirsting  for  the  waters  of  life.  A  school  was  found 
essential  to  the  complete  success  of  their  interesting  work. 
These  teachings  of  Providence  led  to  the  founding  of 

BAKER   THEOLOGICAL    INSTITUTE. 

In  the  spring  of  1866  a  meeting  was  duly  called  at  the 
usual  place  of  meeting,  and  Alonzo  Webster,  D.D.,  Rev.  T. 
W.  Lewis,  A.M.,  Rev.  Samuel  Western  (a  venerable,  always 
free,  colored  man),  Joshua  Wilson,  Charles  Holloway,  H.  J. 
JVIoore,  and  M.  G.  Camplin,  M.D.,  were  selected  as  trustees 
for  the  proposed  institution.  As  temporary  quarters  for  the 
school  the  famous  Ball  Mansion,  at  the  corner  of  East  Buy 
and  Vernon  Streets,  was  secured  by  the  trustees.  The  main 
edifice  was  used  for  teachers'  residences,  class-rooms,  and 
boarding-hall.  The  servants'  quarters  in  the  rear  were  used 
as  dormitories. 

The  following  teachers  were  employed  :  Rev.  T.  Willard 


420  EAiiLY  Schools  of  ME*rHODisM. 

Lewis,  A.M.,  president ;  Alonzo  Webster,  D.D.,  and  C.  P. 
Wolliaupter.  The  teachers  soon  found  as  many  students 
eager  for  instruction  as  they  had  time  to  devote  to  them,  as 
Messrs.  Lewis  and  "Webster  had  large  pastoral  charges  to 
visit,  and  much  preaching  in  and  about  Charleston  w^as 
expected  of  them.  At  the  end  of  about  three  years  the 
school  w^as  transferred  to  better  quarters  on  Lynch  Street, 
where  it  remained  until,  in  1870,  it  became  a  department  of 
Claflin  University,  at  Orangeburg.  The  early  records  of 
Baker  Theological  Institute  were  destroyed  by  the  fire  that 
destroyed  the  main  building  of  the  school  at  Orangeburg ; 
but  it  is  well  known  that  at  least  twenty  of  the  most  promi- 
nent and  useful  ministers  in  the  South  Carolina  Conference 
of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  with  as  many  others 
who  became  teachers  and  laborers  in  other  departments  of 
usefulness,  received  their  early  training  in  this  school,  while 
it  remained  at  Charleston. 

It  was  soon  discovered,  in  the  progress  of  the  reconstructed 
Methodism  in  South  Carolina,  that  the  educational  depart- 
ment of  church  work  demanded  a  larger  field  than  the  city 
of  Charleston  afforded. 

For  some  years  before  the  war  a  good  female  college  had 
been  conducted  at  Orangeburg,  on  the  South  Carohna  Kail- 
road,  about  fifty  miles  below  Columbia,  the  State  capital. 
The  school  had  large,  well-shaded  grounds,  good  buildings, 
affording  accommodations  for  a  large  boarding-school.  The 
location  was  so  far  removed  from  the  coast  and  the  swamps 
as  to  be  safe  from  yellow  fever,  malarial  diseases,  and  as  to 
enjoy  a  pure  atmosphere,  good  water,  a  salubrious  climate, 
and  fine  agricultural  lands.  This  property  was  purchased 
for  educational  purposes  under  the  direction  of  the  Method- 
ist Episcopal  Church.     A  libei*al  charter  was  obtained  from 


Baker  Institute  and  Claflin  University.        421 

the  State,  that  designated  as  trustees  Alonzo  Webster,  T. 
Willard  Lewis,  Samuel  Weston,  R.  K.  Scott,  Thomas  Phil- 
lips, Abram  Middleton,  Simeon  Corley,  and  J.  A.  Sasportas. 
Under  this  charter  the  board  met  at  Omiigeburg,  January  3, 
1870,  with  the  following  officers :  Rev.  T.  Willard  Lewis, 
president ;  Rev.  Samuel  Weston,  vice-president ;  Rev.  A. 
Webster,  secretary  and  treasurer.  At  this  meeting  Rev. 
Alonzo  Webster,  D.D.,  was  duly  elected  president  of  the 
university.  H.  J.  Moore  and  E.  A.  Webster  were  members 
of  the  faculty.  A  course  of  study  was  prepared,  and  the 
school  opened  nnder  favorable  circumstances.  Three  hun- 
dred and  nine  students  were  registered  the  first  year. 

Mainly  through  the  untiring  efforts  of  Dr.  Webster,  an 
act  was  prepared  and  passed  through  the  Legislature  of  the 
State,  approved  March  12,  1872,  locating  one  department  of 
the  State  Agricultural  College  at  Orangeburg,  in  connection 
with  Claflin  University.  An  experimental  farm  adjoining 
the  Claflin  campus,  and  containing  about  one  hundred  and 
sixteen  acres,  was  purchased.  Dr.  Webster  had  the  manage- 
ment of  both  departments,  and  they  have  worked  in  har- 
mony until  the  present  time.  In  Dr.  Webster  the  Freedmcn 
have  found  a  personal  friend,  the  cause  of  education  a  vigor- 
ous and  generous  supporter,  and  the  Church  an  earnest  and 
able  advocate  and  defender. 

At  the  annual  meeting  in  June,  1874,  Dr.  Webster  tendered 
his  resignation  as  president  of  Claflin  University,  and  Rev. 
Edward  Cook,  D.D.,  of  Massachusetts,  was  elected  to  All  the 
vacancy.  Dr.  Cook  having  had  experience  in  the  manage- 
ment of  schools  of  a  high  grade,  was  well  qualified  to  carry 
forward  successfully  the  work  so  well  begun,  which  he  did 
for  ten  years.  In  1876  the  main  building  was  consumed  by 
lire.    But  throuf'h  the  active  exertions  of  Dr.  Cook  and  other 


422  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 

friends  of  the  enterprise,  one  brick  building  was  immediately 
erected,  and  others,  of  inferior  quality,  have  been  added. 

In  June,  1883,  Eev.  Lewis  M.  Dunton,  A.M.,  of  'New 
York,  who  had  been  engaged  in  Church  and  educational 
work  in  the  State,  was  unanimously  elected  vice-president ; 
and  in  June,  1884,  on  account  of  the  protracted  feebleness  of 
Dr.  Cook,  he  was  elected  president  of  the  university,  and  in 
November  following,  president  of  the  Agricultural  College 
and  Mechanics'  Institute. 

There  has  been  a  healthful  and  gradual  growth  of  the 
school  up  to  its  present  proportions.  Others,  besides  those 
whose  names  are  mentioned  here,  labored  for  the  prosperity 
of  the  school,  but  space  forbids  mention  of  their  worthy,  self- 
sacriiicing,  and  even  heroic  deeds. 

There  are  at  present  four  courses  of  study,  college,  scien- 
tific, normal,  and  grammar.  Attention  is  given  to  music 
and  drawing.  The  average  attendance  of  students  is  about 
three  hundred.  Since  the  organization  of  the  school,  there 
have  been  forty-five  graduates  from  the  normal  and  eleven 
from  the  college  courses. 

INDUSTRIES. 

In  addition  to  the  experimental  farm,  there  are  about 
sixty-eight  acres,  mostly  under  cultivation.  In  the  fall  of 
1883  a  liberal  appropriation  was  made  to  the  institution  by 
the  trustees  of  the  John  F.  Slater  Fund  in  order  to  promote 
industrial  education.  Accordingly,  a  good  shop  was  built 
and  furnished  with  tools  suitable  for  ordinary  carpenter 
work,  and  the  manufacture  of  plain  furniture. 

A  printing  department  was  established  in  1885,  job-work 
is  neatly  done,  and  a  so-called  college  paper  published. 

The  Woman's  Home  Missionary  Society  of  the  Methodist 


Baker  Institute  and  Claflin  University.         423 

Episcopal  Church  erected  the  Simpson  Memorial  Home  on 
land  adjoining  the  Claflin  campus,  in  1885.  All  necessary 
appliances  for  housekeeping  are  provided,  and  girls,  in  addi- 
tion to  their  regular  school  duties,  receive  daily  instruction 
in  cooking,  cutting,  sewing,  and  general  domestic  econom}^ 
The  general  boarding  department  is  managed  on  the  club 
plan,  the  students  doing  the  work  under  the  direction  of  a 
matron,  and  thus  the  expense  of  board  is  reduced  to  actual 
cost,  and,  at  the  same  time,  experience  and  instruction  are 
given  them  in  the  art  of  housekeeping. 

Among  the  most  liberal  benefactors  of  the  institution,  and 
the  one  from  whom  it  derived  its  name,  was  the  Hon.  Lee 
Chiflin,  of  Boston,  Mass.  Since  the  decease  of  his  father,  the 
Hon.  William  Claflin,  ex-governor  of  Massachusetts,  has  con- 
tinued to  foster  the  school. 

The  entire  management  has  been  committed  to  the  Freed- 
men's  Aid  Society  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  and 
nothing  prevents  its  continued  growth  except  the  lack  of 
adequate  buildings.  The  prayer  of  those  who  are  most 
familiar  with  the  needs  of  the  institution  is,  that  some  one 
possessed  with  means  will  be  led  by  God's  Spirit  to  provide 
for  another  building. 


APPENDIX 


BY  REV.   D.   P.  KIDDER,   D.D., 

CORRESPONDING  SEORETART  OF  THE  BOARD  OF  EDCOATION  OF  THE  M.  E.  CHURCH. 

As  it  was  found  impossible  to  include  in  the  volume  on  the 
"  Early  Schools  of  Methodism  "  more  than  a  few  sample  sketches, 
it  was  determined  to  supplement  the  text  with  the  present 
Appendix.  Its  object  is  to  exhibit,  in  a  condensed  form,  the 
following  several  showings: 

I.  A  list  of  the  schools  that  were  established  in  the  direct 
interest  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  but  that  ceased  to 
exist  during  the  first  century  of  its  history. 

II.  A  list  of  private  and  local  schools  established  indirectly 
in  the  same  interest. 

III.  A  classified  list  of  the  institutions  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church  in  actual  existence  at  the  beginning  of  1886. 

While  it  is  not  claimed  that  the  several  lists  are  perfect,  it 
may  be  stated  that  no  pains  have  been  spared  to  make  them  so. 
If  any  errors  are  found  in  them,  they  will  be  chiefly  those  of 
omission  due  to  the  neglect  of  parties  that  ought  to*  have  been 
interested  to  make  known  any  facts  not  here  stated.  Hence 
the  aggregates  deducible  from  the  lists,  whether  considered 
separately  or  combined,  will  be  found  below  rather  than  above 
the  actual  facts. 

Briefly  stated  the  following  facts  appear.  Notwithstanding 
all  the  efforts  in  behalf  of  education  made  by  the  early  fathers 
of  Methodism  in  America,  not  one  of  tlie  schools  founded  by 
them  between  1784  and  1819,  or  during  the  first  third  of  our 
first  century,  became  permanent.  Yet,  notwithstanding  the  fail- 
ures and  discouragements  of  thirty-five  years,  the  Church  rallied 
to  educational  effort  from  1820  onward  with  an  ever-growing 
success.  While  the  results  can  never  be  fully  stated,  yet  the 
oflicial  showing  made  by  the  Board  of  Education  to  the  General 
Conference  of  1884  is  full  of  significance.     The  following  is  a 


Appendix. 


425 


snmmaiy  exhibit  of  the  statistics  of  our  literary  and  theolog- 
ical institutions  then  in  actual  operation: 


Clau  or  iMtrmmoM. 

No. 

V.luf  of 

BaildiDir* 

Md  Ground*. 

Endow, 
ments. 

DebU. 

^1 

StndenU 
LMtYear. 

StndenU 
from  the 
Beginuing. 

Theological  Institutions 

ID 

45 

1 

»9 

$440,500 

4,433,"4 

1,855,400 

680,000 

175,626 

6,060,976 

273,700 

18,000 

5,000 

$36,000 

i56i8oo 

62,000 

2,500 

48 

135 
101 

547 
14,375 
10,729 

162,273 

219,953 

23,978 

4,537 

Colleges  and  Universities 

Female  Colleges  and  Seminaries. 
Foreign  Mission  Schools 

»4» 

$7,584,640 

$7,031,176 

$592,474 

»,405 

28,691 

4i3>9'6 

Creditable  as  the  above  aggregates  are,  the  list  from  which 
they  were  derived  took  no  note  of  institutions  that,  for  any 
cause,  had  ceased  to  act  under  the  ownership  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church.  It  is,  therefore,  now  seen  to  be  due  to  his- 
tory to  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  during  the  century  closed 
in  1884,  there  had  been  in  action  not  less  than  84  other  institu- 
tions which,  for  various  reasons,  had  ceased  to  be  enumerated. 
Some  had  been  unfortunately  located,  some  had  gone  into 
other  ownership,  some  had  been  absorbed  in  larger  institu- 
tions, and  some  had  become  extinct  from  unknown  causes, 
not,  however,  without  having  done  good  service  in  their  day. 
Thus  a  grand  total  of  225  institutions  had  been  founded  in  the 
direct  interest  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  while  58 
more  had  been  opened  by  friends,  and  in  many  cases  ministers, 
of  tlie  Church,  although  held  in  private  ownership.  The  full 
history  of  those  numerous  schools  can  never  be  written, 
neither,  probably,  can  their  full  influence  for  good  be  ade- 
quately estimated.  Yet  it  seems  fitting  to  hand  down  to  pos- 
terity, at  least,  the  following  condensed  record  of  their  names 
and  localities,  together  with  the  year  of  their  origin,  and,  when 
known,  of  their  close. 

It  would  have  been  gratifying  to  find  data  showing  how 
many  teachers  were  actually  employed  and  how  many  students 
were  taught  in  the  schools  in  question.  In  some  cases  the  facts 
are  known,  but  they  are  wanting  in  so  many  others  that  no 
attempt  has  been  made  to  give  statistics  on  those  points. 

Conjecture,  based  upon  known  facts  and  certain  laws  of 
average,  indicate  that  in  the  84  Church  schools  that  were,  but 


426 


Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


are  not  now,  in  existence,  not  less  than  300  teachers  were 
employed,  and  88,000  different  students  taught.  Accepting 
these  figures  as  a  minimum  estimate,  and  adding  them  to  the 
actual  statistics  of  1884,  it  is  proved  that  the  Methodist  Episco- 
pal Church,  notwithstanding  the  feebleness  of  its  beginnhigs 
and  all  the  embarrassments  and  disabilities  it  had  to  encounter, 
employed,  in  the  literary  institutions  of  her  first  century,  more 
than  17,000  teachers,  and  taught  more  than  500,000  students. 
In  these  figures  no  note  is  taken  of  the  teachers  employed  and 
the  students  taught  in  the  58  schools  established  and  con- 
ducted indirectly  in  the  interest  of  the  Church. 

On  the  safe  basis  proposed,  educational  statisticians  will 
have  no  difficulty  in  showing  at  various  epochs  of  our  second 
century  the  aggregates  attained  by  future  progress. 

From  the  list  of  our  schools  in  1886  it  may  be  seen  that  the 
short  period  of  two  years  marks  decided  progress  in  the  num- 
ber of  the  schools  of  the  Church,  and  it  may  be  remarked  that 
equal,  if  not  greater,  progress  has  been  made  in  the  payment  of 
debts  and  the  increase  of  endowments  during  the  same  period. 
It  is  to  be  hoped  that  all  forms  of  substantial  progress  will  be 
even  greater  in  the  years  to  come. 


LITERARY  INSTITUTIONS  OWNED  OR  CONTROLLED  BY  THE 
METHODIST  EPISCOPAL  CHURCH  PRIOR  TO  1884,  CHRONO- 
LOGICALLY   ARRANGED. 


N*MK  OF  Institution. 

Location. 

Pkbiod. 

Ebenezer  Academy 

Brunswick  County,  Va 

Abingdon,  Md 

Surry  County,  N.  C 

Jessamine  County,  Ky 

Uniontown,  Pa 

1784— 1 8oo 
1785—1795 
1790— 
1790-1798 
1792 — 1826 

Bethel  Academy 

Union  School 

Cokesbury  College 

Mount  Bethel  Academy 

Asbiiry  College 

Baltimore,  Md 

Newberry  County,  S.  C 

Baltimore,  Md           

1795— 1796 
1797— 1820 
1816 — 1820 

Wesleyan  Academy 

Wesleyan  Seminary 

Augusta  College 

White  Plains  Academy 

New  Market,  N.  H 

New  York  city,  N.  Y 

Augusta,  Ky 

White  Plains,  N.  Y 

1817— 1823 
1819— 1824 
1822—1849 

Jackson,  Ala 

LTniontown,  Pa 

1825-1845 
1827—1832 

Madison  College 

Appendix. 


427 


Nams  or  iManrcTioN. 

Tuscaloosa  Academy 

Randolph-Macon  College 

la  (.irange  College 

Norwalk  Seminary 

Newbury  Seminary 

Amenia  Seminary 

Cokcsbury  High  Scho«il 

1  alley  Seminary 

Gouverneur  Wesleyan  Seminary  

Kmory  and  Henry  College 

\V  eslcyan  Female  College 

Worth ingt on  Female  College 

Centenary  Institute 

I'.erca  Seminary 

Rock  River  Seminary 

\S  esleyan  Female  College 

Newark  Wesleyan  Institute 

1  'aris  Seminary 

Whitewater  College 

Springfield  Wesleyan  Seminary 

I'.altimore  Female  College . . . . 

New  York  Conference  Seminary 

Genesee  College 

I  )anvillc  Seminary 

( .reenlield  Seminary 

Portland   Academy 

Ohio  Conference  High  School 

) Baldwin  Institute 

1  'rookville  College 

I'crry    Academy   

1  ioonifidd  Male  and  Female  College 

Fort  I'lain  Seminary 

Female  Collegiate  Institute 

I  armer  Academy 

I'hornton  Academy 

.Mi>souri  Conference  Seminary 

( iriji^nn  City  Seminary 

S.iuthem  Illinois  Conference  Female  Academy 

Irviiin  Female  College 

Conference  Seminary 

r.ron>on  Institute 

'I  roy  University 

I'uget  Sound  Institute.    

1-  vansville  Seminary 

ll..r.i.line  Lniversity  Preparatory 

M.r-hall  College 

Mumn  Academy 

i'  ultun  Seminary 

I  'anvillc  Academy 

Inland   Female  t  ollcge m 

I'liic  Mount  College 

\\  ilherforcc  University 

1  >anville  Seminary 

l\cx:kport  Collegiate  Institute 

I  "attic  (;round  Institute 

Henry  Seminary 

M.tnsiicld  Classical  Seminary 

V  alparaiso  College 

(lali-sville  University 

Willoughby  Collegiate  Institute 

Mexico  Academy 

Stockwell  Collegiate  Institute 

Central  ( »hio  Conference  Seminary 

Springfield  Academy .    

Stockton  Female  Institute 

W     .    .1  .  .    \ -ndcmy 

'  Conference  Seminary 

'  iiid   Fcnjalc  College 

^..i.iiiti..  Illinois  Female  College 

A  l>;ona  College 


Location. 

Tuscaloosa,  Ala 

Ashland,  Va 

La  Grange,  Ala 

Norwalk,  O 

Newbury,  Vt 

Amenia,  N.  Y 

Cokesbury,  S.  C 

Fulton,  N.  Y 

Gouverneur,  N.  Y 

Emory,  Va 

Macon,  Ga 

Worthington,  O 

Summerfield,  Ala 

Berea.  O 

Mount  Morris,  111 

Wilmington,  Del 

Newark,  N.  J 

Paris,  111 

Centerville,  Ind 

Springfield,  Vt 

Baltimore,  Md 

Charlotieville,  N.  Y.. 

Lima,  N.  Y 

Danville,  111 

Greenfield,  O 

Portland.  Ore 

Springfield,  O 

Berea,  O 

Brookville,  Ind 

Perry,  N.  Y 

Bloomfield,  Ind 

Fort  Plain,  N.Y 

Santa  Clara,  Cal 

College  Corner,  Ind.. 

Thornton,  Ind 

Jackson,  Mo 

Oregon  City,  Ore..,. 

Belleville,  III 

Mechanicsburg,  Pa... 

Bethany,  Pa 

Point  Lluff,  Wis 

Troy,  N.  Y 

Olympia,  W.  T 

Evansville,  Wis 

Red  W'ing,  Minn 

Marshall,  111 

Marion,  Ind 

Lewiston,  HI 

Danville,  Ind 

Poland,  O 

Manhattan,  Kan 

Xenia,  O 

Danville,  N.Y 

Rockport,  Ind 

Battle  Ground,  Ind... 

Henry,  111 

Mansfield,  Pa 

Valparaiso,  Ind 

Galesville,  Wis 

Willoughby,  O , 

Mexico,  N .  Y , 

Stockwcll.  Ind , 

Maumce  City,  O , 

Springfield.  N.  V 

Stockton,  Cal 

Waterloo,  Wis . . 

Ovid,  N.  Y , 

Olney.   Ill 

Salem,   111 

Algona,   la 


PCKIOO. 

1827— 

1830 1845 

183I  — 

1833— 1848 

1833— 1868 

1835-1874 

1836— 1845 

1836—1868 

1837—1868 

1838—1845 

1839—1845 

1839—1874 

1840 1845 

1840— 1846 

1840  —  1878 

1841  — 1880 
1847-1857 
1848—1860 
1848— 1860 
1848—1866 
1849—1883 
1850—1866 
1850—1870 
1851— 
1851- 
185I-1874 
1852- 
1852—1856 

1852 — i8t;o 

1852—1866 

185^—1860 

1853—1872 

1854— 

1855- 

1855—1864 

1856— 

1856— 

1856—1858 

1856—1860 

1856-1861 

1856—1863 

1856—1863 

1856— 1864 

1856—1868 

1856 — 1870 

1857— 

1857—1860 

1857—1864 

1858— 

1858—1860 

1858—1862 

185&— 1863 

1858—1866 

1858— 1866 

1853-1871 

1859- 

1859—1864 

1859 — '872 

1859-1874 

1859—1883 

1860—1862 

1860—1874 

1861— 1872 

1862—1864 

1865- 

1865— 

1866— 

1866— 

1866— 

1872— 


428 


Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 


B. 

SCHOOLS  CONDUCTED  IN  THE  INTEREST  OF  THE  METHODISr 
EPISCOPAL  CHURCH  UNDER  PRIVATE  OWNERSHIP  PRIOR  TO 
1884,   CHRONOLOGICALLY   ARRANGED. 


Namk  of  Institution. 


Oakland  Female  College 

Jonesville  Academy 

Springfield  Female  College 

Bakersfield  Seminary 

Preparatory  School 

Flushing  Female  Institute 

Asbury  Seminary 

C/Corgetown  Seminary 

Hempstead  Seminary 

Morgantown  Female  Seminary 

Bordentown  Female  College 

Charlotte  Boarding  Academy 

Cumberland  Valley  Institute 

Indiana  High  School 

North-west  Virginia  Academy 

Pennington  Female  Seminary 

Sacramento  Seminary 

Santa  Cruz  Academy 

Wesleyan  Seminary 

Olin  and  Preston  Institute 

Rogersville  Seminary 

Church  Hill  Insfitute.. 

Female  Collegiate  Institute 

Fulton  Seminary 

Spring  Mountain  Academy 

Indiana  Female  Coll  ge 

Linden  Hill  Academy 

Mount  Carmel  Academy , 

Shelby  Seminary 

Wellsburg  Female  Academy 

Wesleyan  Female  Institute 

Cottage  Hill  College 

Susquehanna  Seminary 

North-western  Female  College 

Mansfield  Female  College 

Ashland  Collegiate  Institute 

Asbury  Female  Institute , 

Valley  Female  Institute 

Bloomington  Seminary 

Griggsville  Seminary. 

La  Fayette  Female  Institute 

Lebanon  Female  Institute 

Mineral  Point  Seminary 

Mount  Vernon  Academy 

Walworth  Academy 

Mount  Ida  Female  College 

Alameda  Collegiate  1  nstitute , 

Emory  Female  College 

Fairfield  Seminary 

Fairmount  Male  and  Female  Seminary 

Attica  Academy 

Farmer's  Academy 

Coolville  Seminary 

Fau  Claire  Wesleyan  Seminary 

West  River  Classical  Institute 

Richmond  College 

Red  Creek  Academy 

Wesley  Academy 


Location. 


Hillsborough,  O 

Jonesville,  N.Y.... 

Springfield,  O 

Bakersfield,  Vt 

Middletown,  Conn.. 

Flushing,  N.  Y 

Chagrin  Falls,  O.    , 

Georgetown,   111 

Hempstead,  N.  Y... 
Morgantown,  Va. . . 
Bordentown,  N.  J.. 
Charlotte,  N.  Y  . . . 
Mechanicsburg,  Pa. 

Brookville,  Ind 

Clarksburg,  W.  Va. 
Pennington,  N.  J.. . 
Sacramento,  Cal. . . , 

Santa  Cruz,  Cal 

Peoria,  111 

P.lacksburg,  Va 

Rogersville,  N.  Y. .. 
New  Canaan.  Conn. 

Santa  Clara,  Cal 

Lewistown,  111. 


spring 


Mount,  O, 


Indianapolis,  Ind 

New  Carlisle,  O 

Mount  Carmel,  111 

She.byville,  LI 

Wellsburg,  Pa 

Staunton,  Va 

York,  Pa 

Binghamton.  N.  Y 

Evanstnn,  111 

Mansfield,  O 

Ashland,  N.  Y 

Greencastle,  Ind 

Winchester,  Va 

Bloomington,  Ind.. ..    , 

Griggsville,  111 

Washington,  D.  C 

Lebanon,  111 

Mineral  Point,  Wis 

Mount  Vernon    111. . , . 

Walworth,  N.  Y 

Davenport,  la 

Alameda,  Cal 

Carlisle,  Pa 

Fairfield,  N.  Y 

Fairmount,  Pa 

Attica,  Ind , 

College  Corner,  Ind 

Coolville,  O 

Eau  Claire,  Wis 

West  River,  Md 

Richmond,  O 

Red  Creek,  N.  Y 

Wesley,  Ind 


Appendix. 


429 


c. 


CLASSIFIED  LIST  OP  EDUCATIONAL  INSTITUTIONS  OF  THE  METH- 
ODIST  EPISCOPAL  CHURCH  EXISTING  IN  1886. 

Theological   Inatltutions. 


NaMS  of  iNBTITUTIOIf. 


Boston  Uni.  School  of  Theol 
Centenary  Biblical  Institute, 
Drew  Theological  Seminary, 
Gammon  Ih.Sch., Clark  Uni, 
Garrett  Hiblical  Institute... 
Swedish  Theological  Semi'y. 


LoCATIOtf. 


IJoston,  Mass. 
Baltimore,  Md 
Madison,  N.  J. 
Atlanta,  Ga... 
Kvanston,  111 
Evanston,  111. 


1847 
1872 
1866 
1883 
1856 
1883 


FllXaiOBNT  OB  PatMCIPAL. 


Rev.  William  F.  Warren.  S.T.D. 
Rev.  William  M.  Frysinger,  D.D. 
Rev.  Henry  A.  Buttz,  D.D. 
Rev.  W.  P  Thirkield,  A.M:,  B.D. 
Rev.  Henry  B.  Ridgaway,  D.D. 
Rev.  A.  Ericson. 


Colleges  and  Universities. 


Albion  College 

.   Allegheny  College 

Baker  University 

•   Baldwin  University 

Blue  Mountain  University.. 

Boston  University 

Central  Tennessee  College. 

Central  Wesleyan  College.. 

Ch.'iddock  College 

Claflin  University 

Clark  University 

Cornell  College 

Dakota  University 

De  Pauw  University 

Dickinson  College 

Ea.si  Tenn.Wes.  University. 

Fort  Wayne  College 

Gcrm.in  College 

German-English  College... 

German  W.iTlace  College... 

Hamline  University 

Hedding  College 

Illinois  Wesleyan  Univers'y. 
t  Iowa  Wesleyan  University. 

Lawrence  University 

Lewis  College . . . 

Little  Rock  University 

M'Kendree  College 

Meth.  Epis.  College  of  Neb. 

Moore's  Hill  College 

•"Mount  Union  College 

New  Orleans  University... 

North-western  University.. 

Ohio  Wesleyan  University. 

Philander  Smith  College, . . 

Rust   University 

Simpson  Centenary  College. 

Syracuse  University   

Texas  Wesleyan  College... 

University  of  Denver 

I'niversity  of  the  Pacific. .. 

University  of  Southern  Cal . 

^'pper  Iowa  University   ... 

Wesleyan  University 

1^  Willamettr  University 

Wiley  University 


! Albion,  Mich 

IMeadville,  Pa 

jBaldwin  City,  Kan... 

Berea,  Ohio 

La  Grande,  Oregon. . 

Boston,  Mass 

Nashville,  Tenn 

Warrenton,  Mo 

§uincy.  111 
rangeburg,  8.  C 

A  tlanta.  Ga 

Mount  Vernon,  Iowa. 

Mitchell,  Dak 

Greencastle,  Ind 

Carlisle,  Pa 

Athens,  Tenn, 


jFort  Wayne,  Ind 

I  Mount  Pleasant,  Iowa 

JGalena,  111 

;  Berea,  Ohio 

Hamline,  Minn. 

Abingdon,  111. .. 

Bloomington,  III 

Mount  Pleasant,  Iowa 

Aupleton,  Wis 

Glasgow,  Mo 

Little  Rock,  Ark 

Lebanon,  111 

York,  Nebraska 

Moore's  Hill,  Ind... 

Mount  I'nion,  Ohio.. 

New  Orleans,  La 

Evanston,  111 

IDelaware,  Ohio 

I  Little  Rock,  Ark..... 

Holly  Springs,  Miss,. 

Indianola,  Iowa 

'Syracuse,  N.  Y 

Fort  Worth,  Texas  .. 

Denver,  Col 

San  Jose,  Cal 

,  Ix)s  Angeles,  Cal 

Fayette,  Iowa 

I Middletown,  Conn . . . 
I  Salem,  Oregon 
!  Marsh 


,  <  »rego 
all,  1  e 


1861 

18.13 
1858 
1845 


Rev. 

Rev 
Rev 
Rev 


18761  Rev. 
1869' Rev. 
1866,  Rev. 
i864lRev. 
18531J.  B. 
t86giRev. 
1869  Rev. 
i8s7|Rev. 
1885  Rev. 
i837iRev. 
1833  Rev. 
1867;  Rev. 
i846IRev. 
1873;  Rev. 

1868  Rev. 
i864lRev. 

1854  Rev. 
1875  Rev. 

1855  Rev. 
1850  Rev. 
1849  Rev. 

1866  Rev. 
1 88a  Rev. 
i8a8  Rev. 
1880  Kev. 
1854  Rev. 
1846  Rev. 
1873  Rev. 
185s  Rev. 
184a  Rev. 
1877  Rev. 

1869  Rev. 

1867  Rev. 

1870  Rev. 
1880  Kev. 
1880  Rev. 
tSsi  Rev. 
1880  Rev. 
1857  Rev- 
1831  Rev. 
1844  Rev. 

873  Rev. 


L.  R.  Fiske,  D.D.,  LL.D. 

D.  H.  Wheeler,  D.D. 
W.  H.  Sweet,  D.D. 
W.  Kepler,  Ph.D. 

G.  M.  Irwin,  A.M. 
William  F.  Warren,  8.T.D. 
J.  Braden,  D.D. 
H.  A.  Koch,  D.D. 
De  Motte,  LL.D. 
L.  M.  Dunton,  D.D. 

E.  O.  Thayer,  A.M. 
William  F.  King,  D.D. 
William  Brush,  D.D. 
Alex.  Martin,  D.D.,  LL.D. 

J.  A.  McCauley,  D.D.,  LL.D. 
lohn  F.  Spence,  S.T.D. 
W.  F.  Yocum,  D.D. 
William  Balcke,  A.M. 
Emil  Uhl. 
William  Nast,  D.D. 
G,  H.  Bridgman,  D.D. 
Joseph  S.  Cummings,  D.D. 
W.  H.  H.Adams,  D.D. 
J.  T.  McFarland,  Ph.D. 

B.  P.  Raymond,  A.M.,  Ph.D. 
Addis  Albro,  M.S. 

E.  S.  Lewis,  A.M. 

Wm.  F.  Swahlen,  A.M.,  Ph.D. 

Edward  Thomson,  Ph.D. 

L.  D.  Adkinson,  A.M. 

O.  N.  Hartshorne,  LL.D. 

A.  F.  Hoyt,  B.D. 

Jos.  Cummings,  D.D.,  LL.D. 

C.  H.  Pavne,  D.D.,  LL.D. 
Thomas  Mason,  A.M. 

W.  H.  Hooper,  A.M. 

E.  L.  Parks,  A.M.,  B.D. 

Charles  N.  Sims,  D.D.,  LL.D. 

A.  A.  Johnson,  D.D. 

David  N.  Moore,  D.D. 

C.  C.  Stratton,  A.M.,  D.D. 

M.  M.  Bov.ird.  A.M. 

John  W.  Bissell,  D.I). 

John  W.  Beach,  D.D.,  LL.D. 

Thomas  Van  Scoy.  A.M.,  D.D. 

N.  D.  Clifford,  A.M. 


4ao 


Eakly  Schools  of  Methodism. 


Female  Colleges  and  Seminaries. 


Name  of  Institution. 

Location, 

fa 

Pbesidknt  or  Principal. 

Beaver,  Pa 

1853 
1842 
1866 
1866 
1854 
1847 
1851 
1854 

Rev,  R,  T.  Taylor,  D.D. 

Cincinnati  Wesleyan  Coll.. 
De  Pauw  College         

Cincinnati,  Ohio 

New  Albany,  Ind 

Carmel,  N.  Y 

Hillsborough,  Ohio.. 

Jacksonville,  III 

Auburndale,  Mass,. . . 
Pittsburg,  Pa 

Rev.  W.  K.  Brown,  D.D. 
Rev.  L.  M,  Albright,  A.M. 

Drew  Sem.  and  Female  Coll. 
Hillsborough  Female  Coll.. 

Illinois  Female  College 

Lasell  Sem,  for  Young  Worn. 
Pittsburg  Female  College . . 

George  Crosby  Smith,  A.M. 
Rev,  J.  F,  Loyd,  A.M. 
Rev.  W.  F,  Short,  A.M.,  D.D. 
Charles  C,  Bragdon,  A.M. 
Rev.  I.  C.  Pershing,  D.D, 

Classical  Seminaries. 


Albion  Seminary 

Andrews  Institute 

Ashland  C0II.&  Normal  SchM 
Augusta  Collegiate  Institute 

Baldwin  Seminary 

Bennett  Seminary 

Brown  Seminary 

Carleton  Institute 

Cazenovia  Seminary 

Centenary  Collegiate  Inst. . 

Chamberlain  Institute 

Claverack  Acad.&  H.R.Inst. 

Cookman  Institute 

East  Maine  Conf,  Seminary. 

Ellijay  Seminary 

Epworth  Seminary 

Forest  Home  Seminary.  . . . 
Fort  Edward  Collegiate  Inst, 
(jenesee  Wesleyan  Seminary 

Gilbert  Seminary 

Grand  Prairie  Sem, Com. Col. 

tireenwich  Academy 

Haven  Normal  School 

Holston  Seminary 

Houston  Seminary 

Ives  Seminary 

Jennings  Seminary 

ICingsley  Seminary 

La  Grange  Seminary 

I^ewis  Collegiate  Institute. . 
Maine Wes.Sem.&  Fem.Coll. 
Marionville  Collegiate  Inst. 

Meridian  Academy 

Morristown  Seminary 

Mount  Union  Seminary 

Mount  Zion  Seminary 

Napa  Collegiate  Institute.. 
N.H.Conf.  Sem.  &  Fem.Col. 

Ogden  Seminary 

Pennington  Seminary 

Powell's  Valley  Seminary . . 

Roanoke  Seminary 

Rust  Normal  Institute 

Salt  I.ake  Seminary 

Sheridan  Academy 

Simpson  Institute 

Troy  Conference  Academy. 

Tullahoma  College 

Umpqua  Academy. 


Albion,  Iowa 

Andrews  Inst.,  Ala.. 

Ashland,  Oregon 

Augusta,  Ky 

Baldwin,  La 

Greensborough,  N.  C. 

Leicester,  N.  C 

Farmington,  Mo 

Cazenovia.  N.  Y 

Hackettstown,  N.  J.. 

Randolph,  N.  Y 

Claverack,  N.  Y 

Jacksonville,  Fla 

Bucksport,  Me 

Ellijay,  Ga 

Epworth,  Iowa 

Headland,  Ala 

Fort  Edward,  N.  Y., 

Lima,  N.  Y 

Baldwin,  La 

Onarga,  111 

East  Greenwich,  R.  I, 
Waynesborough,  Ga., 
New  Market,   I'enn  . 

Houston,  Texas 

Antwerp,  N.  Y 

Aurora,  111 

Bloomingdale,  Tenn., 

La  Grange,  Ga 

Lewiston,  Idaho 

Kent's  Hill,  Me 

Marionville,  Mo 

Meridian,  Miss 

Morristown,  Tenn 

Mount  Union,  Ala, . . 

Mount  Zion,  Ga 

Napa  City,  Cal 

Tilton,  N.  H 

Ogden  City,  Utah.... 
Pennington,  N,  J . . . . 
Wellspring,  Tenn. . . , 

Roanoke,  Va 

Huntsville,  Ala 

Salt  Lake  City,  Utah 

Sheridan,  Oregon 

Logan,  Ala 

Poiiltney,  Vt 

Tullahoma,  Tenn 

Wilbur,  Oregon 


Edward  P.  Fogg,  A.M. 

Rev.  J.  S.  Blair,  A.M. 

Rev.  W.  G.  Royal,  A.M. 

Rev.  Daniel  Stevenson,  D.D. 

Rev.  W.  S.  Fitch,  A,M, 

Rev.  Wilbur  F.  Steele,  A.M.,  B.D. 

Henry  F.  Ketron,  A.B, 

Miss  Eliza  A.  Carleton. 

Rev,  I,  N.  Clements,  A.M. 

Rev,  George  H.  Whitney,  D.D, 

Rev,  Jas,  T,  Edwards,  A,M.,  D.D. 

A,  H,  Flack,  A.B, 

Rev.  Samuel  B,  Darnell,  B.D. 

Rev.  A.  F.  Chase,  A.  M. 

Rev.  R.  H,  Robb. 

George  W.  Jones,  Ph.B. 

C.  J.  Hammitt,  B.D. 

Rev.  Joseph  E.  King,  D.D. 

Rev.  J,  D.  Phelps,  D.D, 

Rev.  W.  D.  Godman.  D.D. 

Rev.  E.  McClish,  ED. 

Rev.  O.  W,  Scott,  A,M. 

Rev.  J.  N.  Cardozo. 

S.  P.  Fowler,  A.M. 

C,  W.  Campbell,  Ph.B. 

Rev.  J.  E,  Ensign,  A.M. 

Rev.  J.  B,  Robinson,  D.D. 

Joseph  H.  Ketron,  A.M. 

O.  D,  Wagner,  A.B. 

Rev.  Levi  Tarr,  A.M. 

Rev.  E.  M.  Smith,  A.M. 

S.  C.  Leavell,  A.M. 

Prof.  Brooks. 

Rev,  J,  S,  Hill,  A.M. 

Rev,  James  Rogers,  A.M. 

Rev.  R.  Johnston. 

A.  E.  Lasher,  A.M. 

Rev.  D.  C.  Knowles,  A.M. 

Rev.  A.  W.  Adkinson,  A.M. 

Rev.  Thomas  Hanlon,  D.D. 

James  F.  Swingle,  A.M. 

Rev,  J.  E.  Deacon. 

Rev.  A.  W.  McKinney,  A.B. 

Rev.  T.  C.  Iliff,  A.M. 

Rev.  W.  T.  Van  Scoy. 

M.  F.  Parker,  A.B, 

Rev,  Charles  H.  Dunton,  A.M. 

Rev.  R.  Pierce,  D.D. 

Henry  L.  Benson,  A.M. 


Appendix. 

Classical  Seminaries — Continued. 


431 


Namks  of  Ii«stitctio>«. 


Vt.  Meth.  Sem.  &  Fern.  Coll. 

Wesleyan  Academy 

Western  Reserve  Seminary. 
VV'est  Tennessee  Seminary.. 
West  Tenn.Prep'tory  School 
West  Texas  Conf.  Seminary. 

Warren  Seminary 

Will'msport  Dickinson  Sem. 
Wilmington  Conf.  Academy. 
Wyoming  Seminary.. 
Xenia  Seminary 


Montpelier,  Vt 

{ Wilbraham,  Mass 

West  Farmington,  O. 
Hollow  Rock,  Tenn. 

Mason,  Tenn 

Austin,  Texas 

'Fullen's,  Tenn 

Williamsport,  Pa 

Dover,  Del , 

.Kingston.  Pa 

IXenia,  Ohio , 


1834 
1824 
1820 
1874 
1877 
1878 
1883 
1848 
1873 
1844 
1850 


Pbssidsht  OS  Pbincipal. 


Rev.  E.  A.  Bishop,  A.M. 

Rev.  Geo.  M,  Steele,  S.T.D.,  LL.D. 

E.  A.  Whitwam,  A.B. 


Rev.  E.  E.  Alexander. 
Rev.  T.  M,  Dart. 
Rev.  J.  W.  P.  Massey,  A.M. 
Rev.  Edward  J.  Gray,  D.D. 
M.  L.  Gooding,  A.M. 
Rev.  L.  L.  Sprague,  A.M. 
W.  H.  DeMotte,  LL.D. 


Foreign  Mission  Schools. 


Girls'  School 

Theological  School 

Girls'  School 

Anglo-Chinese  College. 

1  biblical  Institute 

Hoys'  High  School. . 
w '    „„j  rr.-i..' 


Women's  and  Girls'  School. 

Girls'  Hoarding  School 

Girls'  Boarding  School 

Fowler  Training  School 

Girls'  Boarding  School 

Wiley  Institute 

Girls  Boarding  School 

Boys'  F'oarding  School 

Training  Sch' I  for  Bible  Worn 

Girls'  School 

Baldwin  Schools 

Theol.  Sem.  &  Normal  Sch'l 

Crirls'  Boarding  School 

Girls'  Boarding  School 

Siplcr  Board'g  Sch'l  for  Girls 

Girls'  School 

Boys'  Mcmori.il  School 

Girls'  High  School 

Centennial  High  School 

Girls*  High  School 

Boys'  High  School 

( iirls'  Boarding  School 

Philander  Smith  Institute.. 

Girls'  High  School 

(iirls'  Boarding  School 

Girls'  Boarding  School 

Poona  School  

Girls'  Boarding  School 

Anglo- Japanese  I'nivcrsity. 
Philander  Smitli  Bib.  Inst.. 

Girls'  Hoarding  Schools 

Girls'  Boarding  School 

Caroline  Wright  Seminary. 

Cobleigh  Seminary 

G'nW  Hoarding  School 

Mexican  School  of  Theology! 

Girls'  Boarding  School 

Girls'  Hoarding  School I 

Girls'  Boarding  School j 

Girls'  Hoarding  School I 

Girls'  Boarding  School j 

Martin  Mission  Institute... 
1  heological  School I 


Loftcha,  Bulgaria. . . 

Sistof,  Bulgaria 

Rangoon,  Burmah . . 

Foochow,  China 

Foochow,  China 

Foochow,  China 

Foochow,  China 

Chinkiang.  China. . . 
Chung-king,  China. 

Kiukiang,  China 

Kiukiang,  China 

Peking,  China 

Peking.  China 

Tientsin,  China 

Tientsin,  China 

Wuhu.  China 

IJangalore,  India 

Bareilly,  India 

Bareilly,  India. 

Bijnour,  India 

Hudaon,  India 

Calcutta,  India 

Cawnpore,  1  ndia. . . . 
Cawnpore,  India. . . . 

1  ucknow,  India 

Lucknow,  India 

Moradabad,  India... 
Moradabad,  India.. . 
Mussoorie,  India. . . . 
Nynce  Tal,  India.. . 

Paori,  India 

Pithoragarh,  India. . 

Poon.i,  India 

Sitapur,  India 

Tokio,  Japan 

Tokio.  Japan 

Tokio,  jap.in 

Fukiioka,  Japan 


Hakodate,  Japan 

Naga-saki,  Japan 

Nagasaki,  Japan 

I'uebia,  Alexico 

Puebla,  Mexico 

Pachuca,  Mexico 

City  of  Mexico,  Mex. 

Montevideo,  S.  A 

Rosario,  S.  A 

Frankfort,  Germany 
Upsala,  Sweden 


1859 
1883 


1883 
i88s 
1872 


1880 
1871 
1884 
1884 
1875 
1885 
1874 
1877 
1866 


18831  Miss  Schenck. 

1883'Rev,  S.  Thomoff,  B.D. 

1 88 1  Misses  Warner  and  M'Kesson. 

i88ilRev.  G.  B.  Smyth. 

1872  Rev.  F.  Ohlinger. 

Rev.  G.  B.  Smyth. 

Misses  Fisher  and  Jewell. 

Miss  Robinson. 

Misses  Wheeler  and  Howe. 

Rev.  C.  F.  Kupfer. 

Mrs.  C.  F.  Kupfer. 

Rev.  J.  H.  Pyke. 

Mrs.  Jewell  and  Miss  Sears' 

Rev.  F.  D.  Gamewell. 

Miss  E.  U.  Yates. 

Mrs.  Jack.son. 

Rev.  J.  A.  Richards. 

Rev.  T.  J.  Scott,  D.D. 

Misses  Sparkes  and  English. 

Miss  Goodwin. 

NTrs.  Cumberland. 

Misses  Layton  and  Hedrick. 

Rev.  F.  W.  Foote. 

Misses  Easton  and  Harvey. 

Rev.  B.  H.  Padley. 
1884] Misses  Thoburn  and  Rowe. 
1884!  Rev.  E.  W.  Parker. 
1868  .Misses  Downey  and  Seymour. 
1884  Rev.  D.  L.  Tompkins. 
18S4  Misses  Knowlcs  and  Mansell. 
1884  Mrs.  Whitby. 
1884  Mrs.  Grant. 
18S4  Rev.  A.  S.  E.  Vardon. 
i884|Mrs.  Lawson  and  Miss  Jacobs. 
i879|Rev.  R.  S.  Maclay,  D.D. 
i88.s! Rev.  M.S.  Vail. 
iP84JMis.ses  .Spencer,  Atkinson,  Watson. 
i884lMiss  Gheer. 

i88o'Mis.ses  Hampton  and  Hewitt. 
1881.  Rev.  Charles  Bishop. 
1879! Misses  Russell  and  F.verding. 
1874  Rev.  S.  W.  Siberts,  A.M. 
1884  '"^Ijss  Warner. 
1874  Miss  Hastings. 
1884  Misses  Loyd  and  Le  Huray. 
1884  Miss  Guelfi. 
1874  Mis.ses  Chapin  and  Denning. 
1858  Rev.  L.  Nippert,  D.D. 
18831  Rev.  J.  E-  fedman.  


432  Early  Schools  of  Methodism. 


Medical  Schools. 

Schools  of  Medicine  are  connected  with  Boston  University,  Hamline  University,  North- 
western University,  Syracuse  University,  University  of  Denver,  and  the  Central  Tennessee 
College.    That  of  the  latter  is  entitled  the  Meharry  Medical  College,  after  its  founder. 

Schools  of  Law 

Are  connected  with  Boston  University,  Illinois  Wesleyan  University,  North-western  Uni- 
versity, and  Syracuse  University. 

Schools  of  Music  and  Art. 

Academy  of  Music  and  Art  in  Illinois  Female  College ;  College  of  Music  in  Boston  Uni- 
versity ;  College  of  Music  and  Art  in  Illinois  Wesleyan  University  ;  College  of  Fine  Arts  in 
Syracuse  University  ;  Conservatory  of  Music  in  Pittsburg  Female  College.  Other  schools  of 
music  and  art  are  believed  to  exist,  but  have  not  been  reported. 


THE  END. 


'    >'vEKvS^ 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  ^.IBRARY 
BERKELEY 

Return  to  desk  from  which  borrowed. 
This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


'    15  1948 


372  -2PW1  5 
JUL  2  8  1972  5# 


LD  21-100m-9,'47(A5702sl6)4' 


* 

N-^ 

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/ 

/ 

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1 

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A 

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